NASA releases video simulation of flight to Pillars of Creation

With NASA's support, a video has been created depicting a flight to the "Pillars of Creation" in the Eagle Nebula, which are 5,700 light-years away from Earth. The virtual camera not only approaches this grand natural "sculpture" of dust and gas but also circles around it, showcasing the full splendor and power of cosmic phenomena. The combination of visible images from Hubble and infrared images from Webb has allowed us to see a multitude of details in this formation.

The "Pillars of Creation" consist of cold molecular hydrogen and dust. However, they are not monolithic. Due to strong winds and radiation from nearby young and hot stars, the pillars are starting to break apart. At the tops of the pillars, one can see long, thin branching structures, each larger than our solar system.

"Flying past and between the pillars, the viewer gets acquainted with their three-dimensional structure and sees how differently they appear in Hubble's visible light and Webb's infrared light," explained visualization expert Frank Summers. "The difference helps us understand why we have more than one space telescope to observe different aspects of the same object."

Within these structures, hydrogen and dust are compressed by gravity into new, forming stars. These new stars will continue the process of dispersing material within the pillars. The tallest of the pillars stretches three light-years from top to bottom, which is roughly 70% of the distance between the Sun and the nearest star to us.

Throughout the visualization, we can see stars at different stages of formation, from protostars to newborn stars with jets. This region is so rich in star-forming phenomena that it continually provides scientists with new data on these processes, ultimately allowing us to refine our knowledge of the earliest stages of stellar evolution. Finally, it is simply beautiful.