AstronomyPicture of the Day—20181204

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

2018 December 4

TheFairy of Eagle Nebula

ImageCredit: NASA, ESA, The Hubble Heritage Team, (STScI/AURA)

Explanation:The dust sculptures of the Eagle Nebula are evaporating. As powerful starlightwhittles away these cool cosmic mountains, the statuesque pillars that remainmight be imagined as mythical beasts. Featured here is one of several strikingdust pillars of the Eagle Nebula that might be described as a gigantic alienfairy. This fairy, however, is ten light years tall and spews radiation muchhotter than common fire. The greater Eagle Nebula, M16, is actually a giantevaporating shell of gas and dust inside of which is a growing cavity filledwith a spectacular stellar nursery currently forming an open cluster of stars.This great pillar, which is about 7,000 light years away, will likely evaporateaway in about 100,000 years. The featured image in scientifically re-assignedcolors was released in 2005 as part of the fifteenth anniversary celebration ofthe launch of the Hubble Space Telescope.