Where did the stars go?

I'm not an astronomer, but phenomena in space and the skies have always interested me. I came across this link...strange photo. I'm familiar with black holes but have never heard of this before:

antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov...

According to astronomers, it's a "dark molecular cloud" or "dark absorption nebulae." Does anyone have more information about this? Thanks!

~Smile

Just follow some of the links provided on that APOD page you supplied. Lots of info there, including infrared pics of the same area which let you see past the dark cloud.

www.eso.org...

Originally posted by Smile
I'm not an astronomer, but phenomena in space and the skies have always interested me. I came across this link...strange photo. I'm familiar with black holes but have never heard of this before:

antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov...

According to astronomers, it's a "dark molecular cloud" or "dark absorption nebulae." Does anyone have more information about this? Thanks!

~Smile

Strange thread Ms TM Gray amazed you didn't think of clicking on the links in the link you gave us.

I hope your not here just to tout your books.

Originally posted by Koka
Strange thread Ms TM Gray amazed you didn't think of clicking on the links in the link you gave us.

I hope your not here just to tout your books.

Hi Koka, I did click on the links in the article...just wanted to know if anyone here at ATS knew more about dark absorption nebulae. I'm not here to tout my books and I apologize if my post or links gave you that impression. (Hence, I've changed my profile, no prob.)

What interests me (concerning the dark molecular cloud) is that this may be a new planet or star forming. I think planets are formed in several different ways...but what about stars? Are they all formed the same way?

Update: found the answer I was looking for in FSME: Space Exploration � Reference Library: www.abovetopsecret.com...
Thank you, cmdrkeenkid, for posting the links.

~Smile


[edit on 20-12-2004 by Smile]

Don't know much about them, looks interesting though. Could be a black hole that sucked everyhting in and then died?

It's just old dust and gas, no?

Go to the link and read what it sais people....it tells you exactly what it is and has plenty of links that explain all the science around it. Very interesting read if your into that kind of stuff

Sorry for the short post, but this is proof that aliens are real and they like to put thier gum on lenses and sensors.

Originally posted by XL5
Sorry for the short post, but this is proof that aliens are real and they like to put thier gum on lenses and sensors.

WHo said anythign about aliens?, Are you a ALien-Phobe?

Nah, aliens are ok. But what would have made a gas that dense and if it was a black hole, why is it not round or even cone shaped? To me it looks like gum on the lens, unless its a cloaking device.

Nah, that's just what happens when your thumb gets in the way of the lens when you take the picture.

Well I'm glad someone looks at that Smile!

Anyway, here's a bit more for the rest of you on absorption nebulae. They're actually quite common. Here's one you may recognize:


The Horsehead Nebula is actually an absorption nebula located between us and the nebula behind it. Basically all that absoprtion nebula are is clouds of dust that are blocking the light from Earth's view. They are most often located among emission and reflection nebulae.

Emission nebula are clouds of high temperature gas. The atoms of the cloud are irradiated by nearby stars, and give off that radiation as they cool. They are most often red because as hydrogen (the most common element in the universe) is ionized it just happens to glow that color. Emission nebular are also common places of star formation.

Reflection nebula are clouds of dust which are just reflecting the light of nearby stars. These are usually blue because the scattering of light is more efficient in that spectrum.

Thanks for posting the above, a good pic of the horsie

It's been known for a long time that there is a lot of dust in the Universe, so nothing really special about this new gas/dust agglomerate.