NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope caught this view of budding star formation inside a cosmic bubble of gas and dust.

The bubble, a region known as RCW 79, sits about 17,200 light-years away from Earth in southern Milky Way and appears in the constellation Centaurus. Astronomers believe the bubble has a diameter of about 70 light-years and took about one million years to form from the radiation and wind of hot, youthful stars.

One light-year is the distance light travels in a year, about six trillion miles (9.7 trillion kilometers). RCW 79 has spawned at least two groups of new stars along the edge of the large bubble. Some are visible inside the small bubble in the lower left corner. Another group of baby stars appears near the opening at the top.

Spitzer took this image on March 10, 2005, but released on April 13, 2005. The young stars within RCW 79 radiate ultraviolet light that excites molecules of dust within the bubble. This causes the dust grains to emit infrared light that is detected by Spitzer and seen here as the extended red features.

-- SPACE.com Staff

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/E. Churchwell