Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/W. Reach (SSC/Caltech)

Dark Globule in IC 1396

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope image of a glowing stellar nursery provides a spectacular contrast to the opaque cloud seen in visible light. The Elephant's Trunk Nebula is an elongated dark globule within the emission nebula IC 1396 in the constellation of Cepheus. Located at a distance of 2,450 light-years, the globule is a condensation of dense gas that is barely surviving the strong ionizing radiation from a nearby massive star. The globule is being compressed by the surrounding ionized gas. The dark globule is seen in silhouette at visible-light wavelengths, backlit by the illumination of a bright star located to the left of the field of view.

The Spitzer Space Telescope pierces through the obscuration to reveal the birth of new protostars, or embryonic stars, and previously unseen young stars. The infrared image, which transforms the dark cloud into a 'flying dragon,' was obtained by Spitzer's infrared array camera. The image is a four-color composite of invisible light, showing emissions from wavelengths of 3.6 microns (blue), 4.5 microns (green), 5.8 microns (orange) and 8.0 microns (red). The filamentary appearance of the globule results from the sculpting effects of competing physical processes. The winds from a massive star, located to the left of the image, produce a dense circular rim comprising the 'head' of the globule and a swept-back tail of gas.

A pair of young stars (LkHa 349 and LkHa 349c) that formed from the dense gas has cleared a spherical cavity within the globule head. While one of these stars is significantly fainter than the other in the visible-light image, they are of comparable brightness in the infrared Spitzer image. This implies the presence of a thick and dusty disc around LkHa 349c. Such circumstellar discs are the precursors of planetary systems. They are much thicker in the early stages of stellar formation when the placental planet-forming material (gas and dust) is still present.

About the Object	Object Name: IC 1396 Globule (Trumpler 37) Object Type: Dark globule inside emission nebula Position (J2000): RA: 21h38m08.7s Dec: +57d26m48.0s Distance: 2,450 light-years (750 parsecs) Constellation: Cepheus (the King)
About the Data	Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/W. Reach (SSC/Caltech) Instrument: IRAC Wavelengths: 3.6 (blue), 4.5 (green), 5.8 (orange), 8.0 (red) microns Exposure Date: November 5, 2003 Exposure Time: 8 seconds per position Image Size: 22.6 x 18.7 arcmin Orientation: North is rotated 5 degrees clockwise from the vertical Release Date: December 18, 2003
Observers	William T. Reach, Principal Investigator (SSC/California Institute of Technology) Erick Young (University of Arizona) Lori Allen (Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory) Jeonghee Rho (SSC/California Institute of Technology) Sean Carey (SSC/California Institute of Technology) Luisa Rebull (SSC/California Institute of Technology) Susan Stolovy (SSC/California Institute of Technology) Alberto Noriega-Crespo (SSC/California Institute of Technology) Sergio Fajardo-Acosta (SSC/California Institute of Technology) Jocelyn Keene (SSC/California Institute of Technology) Thomas H. Jarrett (IPAC/California Institute of Technology) Patrick Lowrance (IPAC/California Institute of Technology) George H. Rieke (University of Arizona) Lee Hartmann (Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory) Aurora Sicilia Aguilar (Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory) Tony Marston (European Space Agency)

Individual Images

	Spitzer/IRAC composite image of a dark globule in IC 1396. Emission from 3.6 microns (blue), 4.5 microns (green), 5.6 microns (orange) and 8.0 microns (red) have been combined in a single image. Screen-Resolution (450x370): JPEG High-Resolution (1142x939): JPEG | Mac TIFF | PC TIFF Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/W. Reach (SSC/Caltech)
	Visible light image of IC 1396. Screen-Resolution (450x370): JPEG High-Resolution (1142x939): JPEG | Mac TIFF | PC TIFF Credit: Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope / J.-C. Cuillandre / Coelum, and the Digitized Sky Survey

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