In the vast and mysterious theater of the universe, where time extends beyond human understanding and space expands beyond the boundaries of our imagination, we witness one of the most fascinating spectacles that nature can offer: the protostar, or the birth of a star.
This cosmic event, taking place in distant regions of space, was recently immortalized from the Hubble Space Telescopean open window onto the infinite that humanity has pointed towards the night sky.
The new image captured by Hubble features a visually impressive collection of interstellar gas and dust, called RCW 7this nebula is located just over 5,300 light years from Earth in the Puppis constellation.
Nebulae are areas rich in the raw material needed to form new stars, and under the influence of gravity, parts of these molecular clouds collapse and coalesce into very young, developing stars, called protostarswhich are still surrounded by rotating disks of residual gas and dust.
From dust to stars: the journey of a protostar
The protostars that form in RCW 7 are particularly massiveemitting strongly ionizing radiation and ferocious stellar winds that transformed the nebula into an H II region.
The H II regions are filled with hydrogen ions, and while HI refers to a normal hydrogen atom, H II is hydrogen that has lost its electron thus becoming an ion. Ultraviolet radiation from massive protostars excites hydrogen in the nebula, causing it to emit light that gives this nebula its soft pink luminescence.
![Protostar](https://tech.icrewplay.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/image_2024-06-21_161823269-1024x701.png)
The creation of an H II region marks the beginning of the end for a molecular cloud like RCW 7. In just a few million years, radiation and winds from the massive stars will gradually disperse the gas from the nebula, even more so as the more massive stars end their lives in supernova explosions.
New stars in this nebula will incorporate only a fraction of the gas in the nebulathe rest will diffuse through the galaxy to eventually form new molecular clouds
The protostar, once formed inside the nebula, is not yet a full-fledged star, it is rather a stellar embryowhich has yet to begin the nuclear fusion process within it, this process is the beating heart of a starthe source of his power and light.
Protostars are extremely hot and dense objectssurrounded by an accretion disk – a flat, rotating structure composed of gas and dust that continues to fall onto the protostar, contributing to its growth –.
As the protostar accumulates mass from the disk, the pressure and temperature inside it increase until reaching the critical point for triggering the nuclear fusion.
The process of nuclear fusion begins when hydrogen atoms in the core of the protostar fuse to form helium, releasing enormous amounts of energy in the form of light and heat. This energy is so intense that it exerts pressure outwards, balancing the gravitational force that tends to compress the star, a balance between internal pressure and gravity which is known as hydrostatic equilibrium.
![Protostar](https://tech.icrewplay.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/image_2024-06-21_161838661-1024x724.png)
Once a protostar reaches hydrostatic equilibrium and begins sustained nuclear fusion, it is said to have entered the main sequence of its stellar life.
A star’s lifetime on the main sequence depends on its mass: more massive stars burn their nuclear fuel more rapidly and have shorter lives, while less massive stars can remain on the main sequence for billions of years.
The Importance of the Hubble Space Telescope
The Hubble Space Telescope has played a crucial role in the observation of these astronomical phenomena, launched in 1990Hubble has revolutionized our understanding of the universe thanks to its ability to observe celestial objects with unprecedented clarity.
Thanks to Hubble, astronomers can study protostars and nebulae in detail, observing processes that would otherwise be invisible from Earth due to the atmosphere that disturbs and limits visibility.
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