Rosette Nebula context image

The Rosette Nebula is a vast star-forming region, 100 light-years across, that lies at one end of a giant molecular cloud the constellation Monoceros. The nebula is estimated to contain around 10,000 solar masses. The nebula is located about 5,000 light-years away from Earth. Intense radiation from the young stars inside a cluster in the nebula causes the gasses to glow. The background image is from the Digitized Sky Survey, while the inset is a small portion of the nebula as photographed by the Hubble Space Telescope. Dark clouds of hydrogen gas laced with dust are silhouetted across the image. The colours come from the presence of hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen.

[Image description: A square, ground-based observation of the entire Rosette Nebula. A large, diffuse donut shape primarily composed of light brown and gray gas and dust extends to the edges. Several bright blue stars are at its clearer center. There are innumerable small stars throughout the background, most of which are blue. A tiny box at center-left connects to a zoomed-in image of this region at bottom left from the Hubble Space Telescope. The Hubble image shows a dark gray V that extends from just below top left all the way down to the lower right corner and back up toward the top right. It looks like thick, irregular smoke. Behind the dark gray on the left side there are arced lines in light orange and yellow. The background at top left is hazier, the blues covered in semi-transparent orange wisps, making a few sections appear green. In the bottom right, the background is bluer. There are a few bright red and purple stars scattered along the right half.]