October 02, 2009 A new image from the Herschel Observatory shows
off the observatory's talents for seeing multiple wavelengths of
light. The infrared observatory, a European Space Agency mission
with important participation from NASA, can use two science
instruments simultaneously to see five different "colors" of
infrared, which is light that we can't see with our eyes. The
new composite picture features a dark and cool region of our
Milky Way galaxy, where material is just beginning to be stirred
together into new batches of stars. Much of this region would
appear dark in visible-light views, but Herschel can see the
very dim infrared glow of cold dust that is only slightly warmer
than the coldest temperature theoretically attainable.
Herschel's view reveals that this star-forming region is even
richer in cold and turbulent material than previously believed.
"Herschel's infrared vision lets us sense the feeble heat from
some of the coldest objects in the cosmos," said Paul Goldsmith,
the NASA project scient