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A Star is Born: New Telescope Captures the Formation of RCW 120

This is an amazing picture taken by the Herschel space observatory of a massive star forming — many times the size of our own sun.

The image of the bubble of “excited gas” was released near the European telescope’s first birthday in orbit. (This is different from the “excited gas” of elderly uncles over the holidays and seems to refer to the gathering of such cosmic gas in the formation of a star. It will be a big baby — about ten times the size of our sun.

RCW 120 is now a white blob that is only a few tens of thousands of years old but will eventually ignite a nuclear furnace at its core. It is not clear what one sends on such an occasion but delivery costs are likely to be a bit high.

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