NGC 1858 is located in the constellation Dorado and is approximately 160,000 light-years away. It is home to several large stars, one of which can be seen shining brightly at the center of the image.
The Hubble Space Telescope of the American space agency NASA recently snapped a stunning photo of the lovely open star cluster NGC 1858, which is situated in a region rich in star-forming regions. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration shared the image on Instagram, which showed an electric sea of stars glistening against a backdrop of pinpricks of light.
Astronomers at NASA estimate that this star cluster is about 10 million years old. They explained that, in addition to its unusual shape, NGC 1858 is an emission nebula, which is a cloud of interstellar gas that has been ionised by UV radiation from nearby stars.
According to the post’s caption, the nebula’s gas produces its own visible light, which can be seen in this image as a faint cloud in the middle and bottom right of the image.
“The cluster is estimated to be around 10 million years old, but contains stars at different phases of their evolution, making it a complex collection. The presence of an emission nebula suggests that star formation recently occurred here since the radiation required to ionize the gas of the nebula comes from stars that only live a short time,” the space agency said.
NGC 1858 is located in the constellation Dorado and is approximately 160,000 light-years away. It is home to several large stars, one of which can be seen shining brightly at the centre of the image. The cluster is surrounded by millions of stars and is located in a busy sky region. The colour and size of the stars vary. Some appear as dots, while others are large enough to capture the telescope’s trademark artefact of four spikes.
