The European Southern Observatory has published a spectacular photo of the central molecular zone of the Milky Way.
While looking like purple and pink clouds caught in a current, this photo actually shows the gas responsible for star formation at the heart of our galaxy, the Milky Way.
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The photo was published on Wednesday (25 February) by the European Southern Observatory (ESO) and reveals unprecedented details of these gases, particularly in what is know as the central molecular zone (CMZ) of the Milky Way.
"This [image] gives us a window to understand how stars and planets form when they're really close and packed together, which we think is how most stars in the universe formed", Steve Longmore, Professor of Astrophysics at Liverpool John Moores University commented.
The photo focuses on a region more than 650 light-years across, made up of cold cosmic gas, "under extreme conditions, invisible to our eyes", the European Southern Observatory explained. It is the largest image ever taken by the 66 ALMA antenna network in the Atacama Desert in Chile, jointly managed by the ESO, the United States and Japan.
