The ballots are counted and a winner in hand for the National Radio Astronomy Observatory’s (NRAO) second annual image contest.

It was this view of an immense dusty gas bubble in our own Milky Way galaxy that napped first place and $1,000 in the NRAO’s contest.

The bubble is the result of wind and radiation spewed from a few hot and massive stars and immense explosions from stellar supernovae. It sits about 30,000 light-years from Earth towards the constellation Vulpecula, and spans 1,100 by 520 light-year patch of sky.

An imaging team led by the University of Manitoba’s Jayanne English captured this view of the bubble using data from the Very Large Array in New Mexico and the Green Bank Telescope in West Virginia. English shares the $1,000 prize with collaborators Jeroen Stil and Russ Taylor, both of the University of Calgary.

Taylor led a survey that used the Very Large Array to take some 3,000 observations over 260 hours to help build this view of the bubble.

"We congratulate Dr. English for producing an outstanding image that beautifully illustrates the power of our radio telescopes," said NRAO Director Fred K.Y. Lo in a statement.

NRAO officials announced the award on Oct. 16, 2006.

-- SPACE.com Staff

Credit: English et al., NRAO/AUI/NSF.