Free Astronomy Magazine July-August 2023

mosaics released here, revealing vast cosmic landscapes. These detailed panoramas feature dark patches of dust, glowing clouds, newly-born stars and the distant background stars of the Milky Way. Since the same areas were ob- served repeatedly, the VISIONS data will also allow as- tronomers to study how young stars move. “With VI- SIONS we monitor these baby stars over several years, allowing us to measure their motion and learn how they leave their parent clouds,” ex- plains João Alves, an astronomer at the University of Vienna and Princi- 47 JULY-AUGUST 2023 T his image shows the L1688 region in the Ophiuchus constellation. New stars are born in the colourful clouds of gas and dust seen here. The infrared obser- vations underlying this image reveal new details in the star-forming regions that are usually obscured by the clouds of dust. The image was produced with data collected by the VIRCAM instrument, which is attached to the VISTA telescope at ESO’s Paranal Observatory in Chile. The observations were done as part of the VISIONS survey, which will allow astronomers to better understand how stars form in these dust-enshrouded regions. [ESO/Meingast et al.] pal Investigator of VISIONS. This is not an easy feat, as the apparent shift of these stars as seen from Earth is as small as the width of a human hair seen from 10 kilometres away. These measurements of stellar motions complement those ob- tained by the European Space Agency’s Gaia mission at visible wavelengths, where young stars are hidden by thick veils of dust. The VISIONS atlas will keep as- tronomers busy for years to come. “There is tremendous long-lasting value for the astronomical commu- nity here, which is why ESO steers Public Surveys like VISIONS,” says Monika Petr-Gotzens, an astronomer at ESO in Garching, Germany, and co-author of this study. Moreover, VI- SIONS will set the groundwork for future observations with other tele- scopes such as ESO’s Extremely Large Telescope (ELT), currently under con- struction in Chile and set to start op- erating later this decade. “The ELT will allow us to zoom into specific regions with unprecedented detail, giving us a never-seen-before close- up view of individual stars that are currently forming there,” concludes Meingast. !