The galaxy is in the holiday spirit! NASA just released images of a green cluster of young stars that the agency has affectionately named the "Christmas Tree Cluster."
NASA (KFOR/Storyful) - The galaxy is in the holiday spirit! NASA just released images of a green cluster of young stars that the agency has affectionately named the "Christmas Tree Cluster."
Telescopes at its Chandra X-ray Observatory captured the cluster, scientifically named NGC 2264, located in our Milky Way about 2,500 light-years from Earth.
NASA said the stars vary in size, with some larger than the Sun, and ranging in age from one million to five million-years-old.
Video at the top of this story shows the cluster appears to be blinking, like Christmas lights on a tree.
NASA explains it like this: "Young stars, like those in NGC 2264, are volatile and undergo strong flares in X-rays and other types of variations seen in different types of light. The coordinated, blinking variations shown in this animation, however, are artificial, to emphasize the locations of the stars seen in X-rays and highlight the similarity of this object to a Christmas tree. In reality the variations of the stars are not synchronized."
NASA also rotated the image 150 degrees so it appears the top of the tree is pointing northward.
