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NGC 2081, Jochen Maes
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NGC 2081, Jochen Maes

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Description

What you're looking at is NGC 2081 and surroundings, an emission nebula in the Dorado constellation, around 160000 light years from earth.

As is common for these types of regions, we see a lot of hydrogen gas and interstellar dust. But what is this dust exactly and where does it come from?

While the exact properties of said dust clouds are a bit difficult to describe in a few words; the short version is that they're made up from various heavier elements (carbon, silicon, iron,...). As the stars within our universe age (and generations of them come and go); the nuclear furnace in their cores will start fusing heavier and heavier elements to keep the star stable (until it can't and the star dies). Some of these elements remain present within the star until the end of its life; quite a bit of them get ejected out into space by stellar winds (in essence the nuclear pressure pushing outwards partially overwhelming the stars own gravity). In heavily populated areas of space (meaning lots of active stars in relative close proximity); these ejected elements will clump together and form these dense clouds.⁣

Image acquisition details:

18x1800" HA
18x1800" OIII
18x1800" SII

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Histogram

NGC 2081, Jochen Maes