Hubble revisits the stunning Trifid Nebula for the first time in 30 years and discovers a growing jet of energy — Space Photo of the Week

It has spots, horns, and a series of colorful glowing bumps. No, this is not an underwater creature. The latest breathtaking photos of the Trifid Nebula captured by the Hubble Space Telescope.

The nebula, also known as Messier 20, is a star-forming region located about 5,000 light-years from Earth in the constellation Sagittarius. Dubbed the “lemon of the cosmic ocean,” this enlarged section of the nebula tells the story of a young giant star throwing a tantrum and spewing out giant bubbles of gas and dust. This region is home to several giant stars (not visible in this field) that have shaped the region for at least 300,000 years.

What makes this image even more special is that Hubble first captured this exact landscape in 1997 using the Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2. Now, 29 years later, Hubble is revisiting this incredible landscape to celebrate its 36th anniversary. This time I used the more powerful Widefield Camera 3.

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In the new image, a mesmerizing orange cloud lining shows where intense ultraviolet radiation from a massive star strips electrons from nearby gas, making it glow. The stellar wind has removed some of the surrounding dust, as shown in the bright blue region where the dust is thinnest. The far right corner, which is almost pitch black, is where the dust is the thickest.

The conspicuous brown-shaped structure to the left of the center of the image is the “head” of the Space Sea Lemon. Its “body” is a rust-colored gas cloud. Between the two “corners”, yellow gas scatters outward like the glow of volcanic lava, as if something is being destroyed there. And that’s exactly what’s happening. According to the European Space Agency, these are areas where ultraviolet light is eating away at gas and dust.

The main peak, visible to the left of Sea Lemon’s head, is accompanied by a jet of high-energy gas. This region is part of a Herbig Halo (HH) object called HH-399, and the jets are emitted by a baby star inside Sea Lemon’s head. (HH objects are bright regions of nebulae produced by the powerful jets of newborn stars.)

The researchers compared the new observations with images from 1997 and actually observed the jet as it expanded. This change allows scientists to estimate the speed of the jet, revealing how much energy the young star is injecting into its surroundings. There is also a thick streak of bright orange and fiery red material that appears to be expanding to the right. This could be a jet ejected from another newly formed star.

Bright orange stars scattered throughout the scene have already won the battle against the nebula. They are fully formed, their light and stellar winds sweeping the space around them. Over the next several million years, the remaining stars buried in the nebula will do the same. The gas and dust gradually disappear, leaving only the stars.

In this image, Hubble not only celebrates 36 years of operation, but also puts its improved capabilities on full display. The newly opened Vera C. Rubin Observatory, located in Chile’s Atacama Desert, also captured the Trifid Nebula, which looks like a giant cotton candy cloud in its first images.