This cosmic landscape is actually one of the largest star-forming regions in the Milky Way. M17, also known as the Omega Nebula or Swan Nebula, is a hot bed of newly born stars, surrounded by colorful blankets of glowing gas and an enormous cold dark hydrogen cloud. First discovered in 1745, the nebula sits 5,500 light-years away in the constellation Sagittarius. The nebula is illuminated and sculpted by ultraviolet radiation from young, massive stars just outside of the images featured in this

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