Celestial cat meets cosmic lobster

Astronomers have for a long time studied the glowing, cosmic clouds of gas and dust catalogued as NGC 6334 and NGC 6357, this new image from the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope being the most recent.

The evocative shapes of the clouds have led to their memorable names: the Cat’s Paw Nebula and the Lobster Nebula, respectively. 

With around two billion pixels, this is one of the largest images ever released by the ESO. Click here for the zoomable image.