Celestial hemisphere:  Southern  ·  Constellation: Vela (Vel)
Gum23 , Gum 23 , RCW 38 , RCW38 - The Cauldron, John Bradshaw
Gum23 , Gum 23 , RCW 38 , RCW38 - The Cauldron
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Gum23 , Gum 23 , RCW 38 , RCW38 - The Cauldron

Gum23 , Gum 23 , RCW 38 , RCW38 - The Cauldron, John Bradshaw
Gum23 , Gum 23 , RCW 38 , RCW38 - The Cauldron
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Gum23 , Gum 23 , RCW 38 , RCW38 - The Cauldron

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Description

After reading up on this object I wanted to bring it out as smouldering coals, ready to burst apart and blaze into flame. Its a H2 area of a giant molecular cloud with embedded young giant O and B stars radiating in everything up to Xray. It is illuminated by a star cluster of 2000 stars (31 are O or B, the workhorses when it comes to emission nebulae) and xray studies show it has embedded in it another 200 stars detectable by their xray radiation  (https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap050108.html). In the technical description there are 2 water masers so there are interesting particle and magnetic things happening. - microwave lasers that can be detected 5000-6000 light years away! (Actually they're surprising common around massive stars and are a marker of active star formation, which just goes to increase RCW 38's cred as a cauldron of star formation) And they say the star cluster is less than a million years old.

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Gum23 , Gum 23 , RCW 38 , RCW38 - The Cauldron, John Bradshaw