File:W5 Star Formation Region.jpg
![File:W5 Star Formation Region.jpg](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/03/W5_Star_Formation_Region.jpg/480px-W5_Star_Formation_Region.jpg?20110613225028)
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Summary
[edit]DescriptionW5 Star Formation Region.jpg |
English: Generations of stars can be seen in this new infrared portrait from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. In this wispy star-forming region, called W5, the oldest stars can be seen as blue dots in the centers of the two hollow cavities (other blue dots are background and foreground stars not associated with the region). Younger stars line the rims of the cavities, and some can be seen as dots at the tips of the elephant-trunk-like pillars. The white knotty areas are where the youngest stars are forming.
W5 spans an area of sky equivalent to four full moons and is about 6,500 light-years away in the constellation Cassiopeia. The Spitzer picture was taken over a period of 24 hours. Like other massive star-forming regions, such as Orion and Carina, W5 contains large cavities that were carved out by radiation and winds from the region's most massive stars. According to the theory of triggered star-formation, the carving out of these cavities pushes gas together, causing it to ignite into successive generations of new stars. This image contains some of the best evidence yet for the triggered star-formation theory. Scientists analyzing the photo have been able to show that the ages of the stars become progressively and systematically younger with distance from the center of the cavities. This picture was taken with Spitzer's infrared array camera. It is a four-color composite, in which light with a wavelength of 3.6 microns is blue; 4.5-micron light is green; 5.8-micron light is orange; and 8-micron light is red. |
Date | |
Source | http://www.spitzer.caltech.edu/images/1951-ssc2008-15b-Spitzer-Reveals-Stellar-Family-Tree- |
Author | NASA/JPL-Caltech/L. Allen & X. Koenig (Harvard-Smithsonian CfA) |
Image use policy: http://www.spitzer.caltech.edu/info/18-Image-Use-Policy
Licensing
[edit]Public domainPublic domainfalsefalse |
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This file is in the public domain in the United States because it was solely created by NASA. NASA copyright policy states that "NASA material is not protected by copyright unless noted". (See Template:PD-USGov, NASA copyright policy page or JPL Image Use Policy.) | ![]() |
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current | 22:50, 13 June 2011 | ![]() | 2,400 × 3,000 (5.51 MB) | Spitzersteph (talk | contribs) |
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Copyright holder | http://www.spitzer.caltech.edu/Media/mediaimages/copyright.shtml |
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Width | 2,400 px |
Height | 3,000 px |
Compression scheme | LZW |
Pixel composition | RGB |
Orientation | Normal |
Number of components | 3 |
Horizontal resolution | 300 dpi |
Vertical resolution | 300 dpi |
Data arrangement | chunky format |
Software used | Adobe Photoshop CS3 Macintosh |
File change date and time | 14:57, 5 June 2009 |
Color space | Uncalibrated |