HUBBLE ATLAS
Bat Shadow (Serpens Nebula HBC 672, or [EC 92] 82) — image from the Hubble Space Telescope

Nebulae

Bat Shadow

June 25, 2020 · NASA · Serpens Nebula HBC 672, or [EC 92] 82

Zoom to full resolution See where it is in the 3D sky Original on NASA ↗

Astronomers using Hubble previously captured a remarkable image of a young star's unseen, planet-forming disk casting a huge shadow across a more distant cloud in a star-forming region. The star is called HBC 672, and the shadow feature was nicknamed the "Bat Shadow" because it resembles a pair of wings. The nickname turned out to be unexpectedly appropriate, because now those "wings" appear to be flapping!

About the colours

These images are a composite of separate exposures acquired by the WFC3/IR instrument on the Hubble Space Telescope. Several filters were used to sample narrow wavelength ranges. The color results from assigning different hues (colors) to each monochromatic (grayscale) image associated with an individual filter. In this case, the assigned colors are: Cyan: F125W Orange: F164N

About the data

The HST observations include those from programs 15597 M. Mutchler (STScI)

More Hubble images of Serpens Nebula HBC 672, or [EC 92] 82