A Dust Cloud in NGC 281

Stars themselves can create huge and intricate dust sculptures from the dense and dark molecular cloud s from which they are born. The tools the stars use to carve their detailed works are high energy light and fast stellar winds . The heat they generate evaporates the dark molecular dust as well as causing ambient hydrogen gas to disperse and glow red. Pictured above , a new open cluster of stars designated IC 1590 is nearing completion around the intricate interstellar mountain named NGC 281 . The dust cloud NGC 281, dubbed the Pacman nebula because of its overall shape , is classified as a dense Bok Globule that lies about 10,000 light years distant.