A Horsehead of a Different Color: Spitzer Captures New Stunning Infrared Image

The Horsehead nebula has gotten a makeover, thanks to NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. The instrument has captured a Horsehead of a different color in infrared light.

The Horsehead nebula is only one small feature in the Orion Molecular Cloud complex, dominated in the center of the new image by the brilliant Flame nebula (NGC 2024). The smaller, glowing cavity falling between the Flame nebula and the Horsehead is called NGC 2023. Altogether, these features are about 1,200 light-years away from Earth.

While the famous Horsehead makes a startling appearance in visible-light images, it's almost unrecognizable in the infrared view. In visible-light, the Horsehead has a distinctively dark and dusty horse-shaped silhouette. In infrared, though, the dust becomes transparent and the nebula looks like a wispy arc. In fact, you can't even see the true outline of the "horse head" that makes the nebula so famous.

In this latest infrared image from Spitzer, blue represents light emitted at a wavelength of 3.6-microns and cyan represents 4.5-microns. Both of these wavelengths come mainly from hot stars. Relatively cooler objects, such as the dust of the nebulae, appear to be green and red.

The image represents one of the ways in which NASA is learning a bit more about features in space. By using new instruments, scientists can explore different aspects of well-known objects, such as the Horsehead nebula and others.

Want to learn more about the telescope? Check out Spitzer's website.

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