NGC 1569, Star Sparks

Saturn, Cassini

L1527 IRS - Protostar

Stars form when bodies of dust and gas create enough mass to create a gravitational effect that's able to then pull in more gas, the process continues and the mass increases until the pressure at the centre is sufficient for fusion to begin.

There's many examples of protostars, in fact back in 2012,  NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope focused in on L1527 IRS, believed at the time to be the youngest forming star ever found.

Recently, the JWST re-visited this protostar, and the title image was the result.

The forming star cannot be visually spotted, but is thought to be around 20-40% the mass of our own Sun already.

If you look closely, you can see there's a dark patch in the centre, this is actually the accretion disk around the newly formed star, what is left over after the formation, may go on to form the planets, in fact, they may be actually starting to be created already, as recent evidence does point to planets being born around the same time as the star does in many cases.

The protostar is only 450 light years from Earth in the Constellation of Taurus, and is thought to be around 100,000 years old, a blink of an eye in the life of a star, particularly of this mass.

A beginner’s star-book, an easy guide to the stars and to the astronomical uses of the opera-glass, the field-glass and the telescope, 1912

M85 (center right) and NGC 4394 (center left) // Bart Delsaert

M85 is an elliptical galaxy, but one that has a complex series of shells and ripples. These features are thought to have been created some 4-7 billion years ago when it merged with another galaxy. It is currently interacting with the barred spiral galaxy NGC 4394, which might be supporting the shells' structure.

This galaxy was an original discovery of Méchain's in 1781 and is an isolated member of the Virgo Cluster, about 60 million light years away.

A solar eclipse seen from space.

The night side of Saturn's largest moon, Titan. Sunlight scatters through Titan's atmosphere, forming purple and gray rings l NASA Cassini

The original Voyager 1 "Blue Movie" which records its approach during a period of over 60 Jupiter days (January 6 - February 3, 1979)

Star clusters shine in the universe l Hubble