Wide-Field View of AG Carinae

Pictured here is the region of the sky around the star AG Carinae, which is positioned in the centre of the image.

The giant star is featured in the latest Hubble Space Telescope anniversary image, and is waging a tug-of-war between gravity and radiation to avoid self destruction. AG Carinae is surrounded by an expanding shell of gas and dust. The nebula is about five light-years wide, which equals the distance from here to our nearert star, Alpha Centauri.