Eagle Nebula

We know that there are many formations of stars, galaxies and nebulae throughout the universe. One of them is the so-called Eagle Nebula and is quite famous. It is located at a distance of 6500 light years from our planet and is in the constellation Sarpens. It has unique properties.

Discovery of the Eagle Nebula

The Eagle Nebula, located 6,500 light-years from Earth in the constellation Serpens, is part of the Messier catalog and is named M16, the sixteenth interstellar object discovered by astronomers. The Eagle Nebula is a cluster of young stars, cosmic dust, and glowing gas.. This cluster of matter forms the backbone of creation, as hot young stars are occasionally born and others die to form new ones.

Discovered by the Hubble Space Telescope in 1995, Dae is considered one of the most beautiful and mysterious regions of star formation, forming the Eagle Nebula, part of the 2 Pillars of Creation, as the star cluster is said to be born from there.

While this Eagle Nebula can be seen with amateur telescopes because it’s not too far from Earth, it also sculpts and glows gas, forming large columns several light-years in diameter that are quite a sight to behold.

Main features

These are the characteristics of the nebula:

• Its age is 1-2 million years.
• This nebula is part of the Emission Nebula or H II region and is registered as IC 4703.
• It is located about 7,000 light-years away in a star-forming region.
• The gas needle is visible from the nebula’s northeast, 9.5 light-years away and about 90 billion kilometers in diameter.
• This nebula has a group of about 8,100 stars, most concentrated in the northeastern region of the Pillars of Creation.
• It is part of the so-called Pillars of Creation, as new stars are occasionally born from its giant gas tower.
• It is estimated to have 460 very bright spectral-type stars, 1 million times more luminous than the Sun.
• Just as stars are born from its giant tower, the Eagle Nebula also sees millions of stars die and become bright new stars.

The Eagle Nebula, which may have been photographed by many telescopes around the world, was first imaged by the Hubble Space Telescope in 1995 with the glory of Eagle Nebula-5, which shows that new stars are being born from these columns, in aggregates of gas called EGGs.

Since then it has been used as a showcase for the beauty of our outer space. Another image of the nebula was taken by ESA’s Herschel Space Telescope. This fully reflects the pillars of creation, the gas and dust that created this nebula.

This nebula, also seen from an X-ray perspective with ESA’s XMM-Newton Space Telescope, introduces us to hot young stars and their role in sculpting their columns.

Other telescopes studying the nebula are the European Southern Observatory’s VTL in Paranal, Chile, with an infrared display, and the 2.2-meter diameter Max Planck Gesellschaft telescope in the La Silla region of Chile. These telescopes give us beautiful pictures and show us what is happening in this part of the sky.

How to observe the Eagle Nebula

To observe Messier 16, you must have a good quality telescope, have the best weather conditions, have the sky in the darkest place, away from light pollution, and have the exact location of the nebula. That’s not to say that you won’t have the occasional stumbling block when viewing the nebula.

One of the easiest ways to find M16 is to locate the constellation Eagle and move toward its tail. Where is the star, Aquila? When you reach this point, you go directly to the Scoot constellation. At this point, you just need to drive south to reach the Star Gamma Scoot.

After finding the star gamma scoot, you examine it. There you will see the star cluster known as Messier 16. With better quality prism binoculars and your sky conditions, you will be able to observe its cloudiness, but with a large aperture telescope, you will be able to observe the Eagle Nebula in its place. the best.

History

Swiss astronomer Jean-Philippe Loy de Chessault was one of the first to discuss Olbers’ paradox. He did this a few years before the birth of Heinrich Olbers himself, but the paradox eventually gave rise to the latter’s name.

He was also the first to observe the Eagle Nebula, which he did in 1745. Although Chessault did not see the nebula, he was only able to identify the star cluster at its center: NGC 6611 (as it is now known). This is the first recorded account of the Eagle Nebula.

But just a few years later (1774), Charles Messier included the cluster in his catalog and named it M16. Messier’s catalog is a list of 110 nebulae and star clusters that is still widely used by astronomy enthusiasts today. This is probably the most famous list of celestial bodies in the world.

Years later, with the development of telescopes, astronomers were able to see parts of the nebula surrounding NGC 6611 (a star cluster). People began to talk about the Nebula, but since they still could not see the eagle, they called her the Queen of the Stars.

But the advent of astrophotography is a new turning point, because there is much more detail in astronomical observations. It turns out that the nebula has dark regions, large plumes of gas and an eagle-like shape. So this nebula was given a new name: the Eagle Nebula.

I hope that with this information you will be able to learn more about the Eagle Nebula and its features.

See also: James Webb Space Telescope spots baby stars cocooned in the Orion Nebula