The Cave Nebula: Sharpless 2-155 in Cepheus

The Cave Nebula: Sharpless 2-155 in Cepheus

This image was obtained with the wide-field view of the Mosaic camera on the 4-meter Mayall Telescope at Kitt Peak National Observatory. Sh2-155, informally known as the "cave nebula," is a dark cloud of gas embedded in a giant emission nebula. The top edge of the cloud is illuminated by several hot, massive (OB) stars that are part of the Cepheus OB3 association. The image was generated with observations in Hydrogen alpha (red), Sulphur [S II] (blue) and I (orange) filters. In this image, North is left, East is down.

The Nicholas U. Mayall Telescope is a four-meter (158-inch) reflector telescope in Arizona named after the American observational astronomer of the same name. The telescope saw first light on February 27, 1973, and was the second-largest in the world at that time.

Credit: T.A. Rector (University of Alaska Anchorage) and H. Schweiker (WIYN and NOIRLab/NSF/AURA)

Release Date: June 30, 2020

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