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Get the Popular Science daily newsletter\ud83d\udca1<\/p>\n
Breakthroughs, discoveries, and DIY tips sent six days a week.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n By signing up, you confirm you are 16+, will receive newsletters and promotional content and agree to our Terms of Use<\/a> and acknowledge the data practices in our Privacy Policy<\/a>. You may unsubscribe at any time.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/section>\n At a spry 36-years-young, the NASA\/ESA Hubble Space Telescope just keeps on going<\/a>. The groundbreaking observatory<\/a> recently took a new image<\/a> of a sprawling nebula located in the Large Magellanic Cloud<\/a> (LMC). The LMC is the largest of the small galaxies that orbit our home Milky Way galaxy, and it\u2019s only 160,000 light-years away. Since it is relatively close by, astronomers can more easily observe star birth hot spots like LHA 120-N44 (or N44).<\/p>\n N44 is located in the constellation Dorado. It is dominated by two main features\u2014a large central void and an outer shell made of dense, dusty gas.\u00a0<\/p>\n The central void is considered a \u201csuperbubble,\u201d that spans about 210 by 140 light-years across<\/a>. N44\u2019s superbubble void was created by the powerful stellar winds and explosive supernovae from the glittery stars<\/a> at the center.\u00a0<\/p>\n The shell surrounding the superbubble is made of all of the gas that was expelled when these stars in the void were born. Once the gas was swept away, it compressed and formed a shell around the superbubble. Now, new stars are forming in this compressed gas shell, making it an interesting target for astronomers. They are using N44 to study how stars form in this type of cosmic environment.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cTheir goal is to understand how long it takes from the collapse of cold gas clouds into dense knots to the moment nuclear fusion ignites in the heart of a newborn star,\u201d NASA writes.\u00a0<\/p>\n The gas shell surrounding N44\u2019s superbubble has intrigued astronomers for over half a century. It is energized by ultraviolet radiation from massive stars, which makes it glow and highlights several distinct features. In the 1950s, astronomer Karl Henize<\/a> first catalogued the distinct features<\/a> within the nebula\u2019s star-forming complex.\u00a0<\/p>\n One feature is a smaller bubble (cataloged as N44F). It is an interstellar bubble blown by the intense stellar winds coming from one hot and massive star and is located in the upper-right corner of the new image.\u00a0<\/p>\n This Hubble Space Telescope image features the picturesque nebula LHA 120-N44, or N44. The interstellar bubble N44F is at the top right corner. Image: NASA, ESA\/Hubble, D. Gouliermis.<\/em><\/p>\n An Hubble closeup of N44F released in August 2025<\/a> shows how the hot, massive star\u2019s winds and radiation have sculpted the surrounding bubble over time and forged pillars of dusty gas.<\/p>\n The data used in this image is from observing program #14689; PI: Gouliermis. It used Hubble to survey N44 and take a census of its stars, cataloguing roughly 500,000 stars within the cluster,<\/a> and some interlopers drifting in front of the nebula. Of the stars the team surveyed, roughly 30,000 are what astronomers call pre-main-sequence stars. These baby stars have not begun to fuse hydrogen into helium in their cores<\/a>. Hubble\u2019s highly-sensitive instruments were able to pick out faint objects in crowded clusters to find these young stars at work.<\/p>\n \t\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n 2026 Popular Science Home of the Future Awards<\/p>\n![\"This](\"https:\/\/www.popsci.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/nasa-superbubble-embed.jpg?strip=all&quality=85\")
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