APOD: The Cygnus Wall of Star Formation (2022 Aug 15)

[APOD Robot]

The Cygnus Wall of Star Formation

Explanation: The North America nebula on the sky can do what the North America continent on Earth cannot -- form stars. Specifically, in analogy to the Earth-confined continent, the bright part that appears as Central America and Mexico is actually a hot bed of gas, dust, and newly formed stars known as the Cygnus Wall. The featured image shows the star forming wall lit and eroded by bright young stars, and partly hidden by the dark dust they have created. The part of the North America nebula (NGC 7000) shown spans about 15 light years and lies about 1,500 light years away toward the constellation of the Swan (Cygnus).

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[orin stepanek]

CygnusWall_Bogaerts_4143.jpg

?? Making dust to hide their birth? privacy
Beautifully done!

닙스4.jpg

I'm hiding!

[De58te]

Did the description say the North American continent can't form stars? I disagree. If we replace the word form for create, isn't Hollywood on the North American continent, and every year Hollywood creates 4 or 5 new stars. ( To replace old stars that retire such as Robert Redford or Meg Ryan.)

[johnnydeep]

Did the description say the North American continent can't form stars? I disagree. If we replace the word form for create, isn't Hollywood on the North American continent, and every year Hollywood creates 4 or 5 new stars. ( To replace old stars that retire such as Robert Redford or Meg Ryan.)

And some of those newly minted stars are even "hot and young"

[johnnydeep]

Alright, one thing caught my eye here. Is the particularly well lit ruddy dust patch in the middle of the "Gulf" anything particularly interesting?

red dust patch in the middle of the cygnus gulf.JPG

[starsurfer]

Alright, one thing caught my eye here. Is the particularly well lit ruddy dust patch in the middle of the "Gulf" anything particularly interesting?


red dust patch in the middle of the cygnus gulf.JPG

HBC 722!!!!! I remember being obsessed with this back in 2010. You can see a closer view of it by Antonio Sánchez here.

[FLPhotoCatcher]

Alright, one thing caught my eye here. Is the particularly well lit ruddy dust patch in the middle of the "Gulf" anything particularly interesting?


red dust patch in the middle of the cygnus gulf.JPG

HBC 722!!!!! I remember being obsessed with this back in 2010. You can see a closer view of it by Antonio Sánchez here.

Someone needs to get the JWST on it, STAT!

Does anyone know if there is a Hubble view of it?

[johnnydeep]

Alright, one thing caught my eye here. Is the particularly well lit ruddy dust patch in the middle of the "Gulf" anything particularly interesting?


red dust patch in the middle of the cygnus gulf.JPG

HBC 722!!!!! I remember being obsessed with this back in 2010. You can see a closer view of it by Antonio Sánchez here.

Cool. 2010 was when it had an outburst of some kind! Here's a more digestible (for me) to read article about it:

Astronomer Joel Green of The University of Texas at Austin has been following a rare massive flare from a nascent star similar to the early Sun using the European Space Agency’s infrared Herschel Space Observatory and a cadre of other telescopes. Green has found that this protostar, called HBC 722, is situated in a tangled web of gas and protostars tightly packed into a small area. Green’s research is published in today’s issue of The Astrophysical Journal Letters.

HBC 722 lies 2,000 light-years away in the “Gulf of Mexico” region of the North America Nebula (NGC 7000), in the constellation Cygnus, the swan. In early 2009, it appeared to be an ordinary young star in a cloud of similarly young stars. Like most stars less than a few million years old, HBC 722 is surrounded by a disk of gas and dust, perhaps beginning to form a planetary system. It began to brighten, slowly at first, increasing dramatically during the summer of 2010. By late September 2010, it was 20 times brighter than it had been the year before. Since that time, it has slowly begun to settle back down.

Click to view full size image