It has an easily recognizable shape which resembles the head of a horse. Heavy concentrations of
dust in the Horsehead Nebula region and the neighbouring Orion Nebula are localized into
interstellar clouds resulting in alternating sections of nearly complete opacity and transparency. The darkness of the Horsehead is caused mostly by thick dust blocking the light of stars behind it. The lower part of the Horsehead's neck casts a shadow to the left. The visible dark nebula emerging from the gaseous complex is an active site of the formation of "low-mass" stars. Bright spots in the Horsehead Nebula's base are young stars just in the process of forming. The dark cloud of dust and gas is a region in the Orion molecular cloud complex, where star formation is taking place. It is located in the constellation of
Orion, which is prominent in the winter evening sky in the Northern Hemisphere and the summer evening sky in the Southern Hemisphere. in the bottom left corner. Colour images reveal a red colour that originates from ionised
hydrogen gas (
Hα) predominantly behind the nebula, and caused by the nearby bright star
Sigma Orionis.
Magnetic fields channel the gases, leaving the nebula into streams, shown as foreground streaks against the background glow. A glowing strip of hydrogen gas marks the edge of the enormous cloud, and the densities of nearby stars are noticeably different on either side. in 2001. The image was captured upon popular demand to celebrate the eleventh anniversary of the telescope. with the Horsehead Nebula to the lower left of the belt star
Alnitak ==See also==