2023-12-20 16:45:12
A few days before the start of the end-of-year festivities, the Christmas spirit has invaded homes around the world, but also space, where a “pile of Christmas trees” has appeared, according to an image shared by The NASA.
“It’s starting to look a lot like the cosmos,” the American space agency wrote on X on Tuesday, using the words of a famous Christmas song.
The fir tree illusion, known as NGC 2264, was formed by a constellation of young stars, some of which are larger than the sun and between 1 and 5 million years old.
This star cluster would be located in the Milky Way, nearly 2,500 light years from Earth.
“This new composite image emphasizes the resemblance to a Christmas tree through color and rotation choices. The blue and white lights are young stars emitting X-rays detected by NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory,” the space agency explained in a statement.
The pine needles shown with a green glow are actually gas.
“This image was rotated clockwise approximately 160 degrees from the astronomical standard of North pointing upwards, so it appears that the top of the tree is toward the top of the image,” NASA said.
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