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The Hubble Space Telescope, for its 31st birthday,
has captured a glimpse of an incredible star,

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one of the brightest stars in our galaxy. This giant
Luminous Blue Variable star, known as AG Carinae,

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is huge! 70 times more massive than our Sun
and shining with the brilliance of a million Suns.

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The star is surrounded by a glowing halo of
gas and dust. This vast structure was created

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from giant eruptions from the star about 10,000
years ago, creating an expanding shell that

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is now nearly 5 light-years across, similar
to the distance from our Sun to its nearest

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neighbor star. The outbursts expelled the
star’s outer layers, blowing out material

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nearly 10 times the mass of our Sun.

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The nebula around the star from these ancient
eruptions is being impacted by a powerful

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wind of charged particles flowing out from
the star at a million kilometers per hour,

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10 times faster than the nebula itself is expanding.
As this outflowing gas slams into the slower

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moving outer nebula, it creates a snowplow
effect, clearing a cavity around the star,

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and sculpting structures in the nebula.

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Searing radiation from the star is lighting
up the nebula, as seen by Hubble in both visible

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light and in the ultraviolet light that can
only be seen from space. Red colors indicate

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glowing hydrogen gas laced with nitrogen gas;
at the upper left in the image, the diffuse

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red glow shows a region where the stellar
wind has broken through a tenuous region of

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material and swept it into space. Blue features,
shaped like tadpoles and bubbles, are dust

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clumps shaped by the stellar wind and illuminated
by the star’s reflected light.

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This incredible image from the Hubble Space
Telescope shows how even one star can be incredibly

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beautiful and powerful as it impacts its surrounding
environment.

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Since Hubble orbits above the Earth’s atmosphere,
it can give us a clear, detailed view of this

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kind of awe-inspiring beauty and activity
in the universe.

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For the past 31 years, the Hubble Space Telescope
has changed the way we think of space and

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our place in the cosmos. Hubble has revealed
an incredible diversity of stars, and gives

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us pristine views into beautiful interstellar
nebulas, where new stars and their surrounding

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disks of dust and planets continue to form.

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Looking even deeper into space, Hubble makes
it possible for us to see across billions

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of light-years, revealing ancient, adolescent
galaxies that we can compare with our own

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Milky Way. Hubble is even refining our understanding
of the age of the universe and its rate of

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expansion. It sees the telltale effects of
mysterious black holes, dark matter,

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and dark energy over time.

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In the past year alone, Hubble revealed a
large concentration of small black holes nestled

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within the heart of a globular cluster of
stars. It rewound the clock to calculate the

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age and site of a supernova blast. It also
detected a possible new second atmosphere

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formed on a distant exoplanet. And closer
to home, Hubble spotted a comet lurking near

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Jupiter and its Trojan asteroids. These are
just a handful of Hubble’s recent discoveries.

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Hubble remains in excellent technical health
and is expected to continue its exploration

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of the universe for years to come. From 1993
to 2009, there were five astronaut servicing

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missions for repairs and upgrades of the telescope.
These, along with an ongoing crew of attentive

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experts on the ground, are keeping the telescope
today at the peak of its scientific capabilities.

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You can find out more about the Hubble Space
Telescope at the website: nasa.gov/hubble

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and on social media @NASAHubble.

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