What Are Nebulae And How Are They Formed?

A nebula is mostly a cloud of gas and dust in space, and if you have more than one, they are called nebulae. Nebulae are some of the most spectacular objects in the universe, and many have been named after familiar objects, including land animals, insects, aquatic animals, birds, with some even named after ghostly apparitions.

But how exactly does a nebula form in the vast and apparent vacuum of space? Read on and find out!

How is a Nebula Formed?

Intergalactic space contains less than ten atoms per cubic meter, but it’s not an absolute vacuum! Nature abhors empty space, after all! A nebula begins to form when a few atoms get close enough to clump together. Naturally, the more atoms that clump up, the stronger their gravitational influence then becomes. This in turn allows them to draw even more particles towards them and after eons of time, you get a large gaseous cloud forming in space.

Some parts of the cloud may also become even denser than other areas. As more and more matter accumulates, the material (mostly hydrogen) may then reach a point when it starts to collapse in upon itself. At some critical point, the sheer mass and high gravity then starts a nuclear reaction and hydrogen begins fusing to make helium. Eventually, a sun is born, formed within a cloud of dust and gas.

A Nursery for Stars and Planets

The light from that new star starts pushing extra gas away with its solar wind. More concentrations develop and planets form. Most of the rest of the gas travels off and starts new cascades of accumulation and more stars and planets form. It repeats the process over and over again. Nebulae are actually stellar nurseries; they’re the places where stars are born. Sometimes it’s even the place where stars die.

Every once in a while a star blows up. It runs out of hydrogen or helium fuel, it gets too big, collapses and then goes boom (don’t worry our Sun is stable for about another 5 billion years). The resulting explosion sends out material and shock waves that can disturb the nebulae causing it to form more stars. It’s an ongoing process.

Four Main Types Of Nebulae

– Planetary Nebulae: These are called such because when astronomer William Herschel viewed them through his small telescope in the 1780s he thought their shapes resembled the gas giant planets of our solar system, such as Uranus which he had recently discovered. One of the best examples of a planetary nebula is the Ring Nebula (M57) in Lyra, with other beautiful examples including the Helix Nebula in Aquarius, and the Eskimo Nebula in Gemini.

– Reflection Nebulae: A reflection nebula does not emit any visible light of its own, and shines only because the light from an embedded source illuminates its dust. The brightest reflection nebulae are stellar nurseries in which their thick gas and dust layers are illuminated by the light being radiated by its young, bright stars, and are often blue in color. The Trifid Nebula (M20) in Sagittarius is a good example of a reflection nebula illuminated by a group of stars, while another example is the Pleiades reflection nebula in Taurus.

– Emission Nebulae: In the Crab Nebula, the Orion Nebula (M42), and other similar emission nebulae, ultraviolet light from young, hot stars strip electrons from the surrounding hydrogen atoms. As they recombine they emit longer wavelengths in the red part of the spectrum, which gives them their distinctive red color. These types of nebulae often appear to have dark areas as their clouds of dust block the light. Many nebulae have components of both reflection and emission, including the Trifid Nebula.

– Absorption Nebulae: This type of nebula absorbs or obscures the light coming from sources behind them, including stars and bright nebulae, a famous example of which is the Horsehead Nebula. The darkness of the Horsehead is caused mostly by thick dust, although the lower area of the Horsehead’s neck casts a shadow to the left. Also known as Dark Nebula, the shapes they form are very irregular, with the largest varieties visible to the naked eye as dark patches, such as the Coalsack Nebula which obscures parts of the bright Milky Way.

Studying ‘Andromeda Nebula’ Proved that Galaxies Exist

Less than 100 years ago people believed that our galaxy was the whole universe, and before the 1920s astronomers used to believe that the galaxies (other than our own) that they observed through their telescopes were actually local nebulae within our own Milky Way Galaxy. They subsequently called them “spiral nebulae”.

It wasn’t until astronomer Edwin Hubble decided to tackle this particular subject, however, that he managed to resolve individual stars in a spiral nebula using his 100-inch telescope at the Mount Wilson Observatory. He then discovered that they weren’t mere gas clouds at all, but actual galaxies just like our own, and that the Andromeda Nebulae turned out to be the Andromeda Galaxy!

Our understanding of the size of the Universe jumped forwards many orders of magnitude that day! We now know there are at least 100 billion other galaxies, each with hundreds of billions of stars; we know that most stars have planets if we understand stellar formation correctly. That’s a lot of planets where life might exist. And all that came from studying nebulae.

Conclusion

Stellar Nurseries and Stellar Graveyards – nebulae have it all. They mark the beginning and end of stars in the universe. They can be hundreds of light-years from side to side, but are still so tenuous that if you scooped out a chunk the size of our home planet, it would only mass a very few kilograms. Whatever kind they are, they’re fascinating to look at. Go grab a telescope and take a peek! You might like to check out the Orion Nebula (M42), for instance, which is situated 1,344 light-years distant in Orion’s Belt and is visible to the naked eye.