NASA’s Universe of Learning project turns a James Webb Space Telescope image of the Cosmic Cliffs into an amazing 3D visualization. This is a star-forming area in the Carina Nebula Complex, specifically in the Gum 31 nebula, where the young star cluster NGC 3324 lives.
Found about 7,600 light-years away, this area looks like huge mountains and valleys but is really a giant wall of gas and dust shaped by strong ultraviolet radiation and stellar winds from NGC 3324’s stars. The visualization, made using data from Webb, Hubble, Spitzer, and Chandra X-ray Observatory, creates a cool fly-through experience.
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The visualization shows things like dust pillars, protostellar jets, and streams of hot, ionized gas that resemble mist, making the region’s 3D structure clear. Bright yellow streaks and arcs mark the outflows from young stars, with a prominent protostellar jet visible in the upper right. Unlike a flat 2D picture, this 3D model makes it easier to understand the size and complexity of this star-forming area.
The cliffs stretch across light-years. If you could stand on one of those “peaks,” Earth’s biggest mountains would seem like tiny anthills. The hot, young stars in NGC 3324 give off intense radiation that wears away the gas and dust, shaping the cliffs’ dramatic forms over millions of years, like a cosmic sandstorm.
Bringing this amazing Webb image to life helps the public to comprehend the three-dimensional structure inherent in the 2D image, and to develop a better mental model of the universe,” said STScI’s principal visualization scientist and leader of the AstroViz Project.
