Science Art: Cosmic Reef, by the Hubble Space Telescope

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Astronomers are marking the 30th anniversary of the Hubble Space Telescope with a “ portrait of a firestorm of starbirth in a neighboring galaxy” – an image of two nebulae in the Large Magellanic Cloud, NGC 2014 (the big red one) and NGC 2020 (the little blue one). Because of all the dust coalescing there, this is a place where stars are born – little by little, accumulating matter until they start fusing under their own gravity.

Credits: NASA, ESA and STScI