The Dark Seahorse in Cepheus

Spanning light-years, this suggestive shape known as the Seahorse Nebula appears in silhouette against a rich, luminous background of stars. Seen toward the royal northern constellation of Cepheus, the dusty, obscuring clouds are part of a Milky Way molecular cloud some 1,200 light-years distant. It is also listed as Barnard 150 (B150), one of 182 dark markings of the sky cataloged in the early 20th century by astronomer E. E. Barnard . Packs of low mass stars are forming within , but their collapsing cores are only visible at long infrared wavelengths . Still, the colorful stars of Cepheus add to this pretty, galactic skyscape .