We Are The Children of Nebulae

Art by Teun van der Zalm

Nebulae- truly a unique phenomenon, not only in its beauty, but in its essence. Huge accumulations of interstellar gas and dust stretch for hundreds of thousands of light years. Simultaneously being the product of the end, and the source of the beginning.

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Not everyone is given the light. Some are an impenetrable cover that absorbs any light that tries to escape from the captivity of darkness. In their depths can be hidden newborn luminaries, surrounded by new planets. Or the cold emptiness that only have to acquire the appearance.

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Others - the posthumous crown of forefather's star. The aura of an emitted substance from the surface of the pulsating sun, which is going to transform into something completely different. Prelude to a supernova explosion. These nebulae only reflect the light of the matter-smith, standing behind them.

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The most short-lived - a fleeting strangers, driven by shock waves and interstellar winds. The smallest particles collected in giant clusters by the irresistible force of living cosmic titans. They are like sand dunes, whose life span of 10,000 years is just a moment in the scale of the Universe.

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At the edges of galaxies, and in their centers, you will fall into the captivity of the star forges. Possessing the masses of millions of unborn suns, endless bright red clusters of hydrogen and helium. By the will of gravity, the creators of all living and dead stars in the universe.

Finally, the most unimaginable of all, the final chords of life and death - the results of supernova explosions. Billions of millions of particles escaped from a single point of space and time at speeds of 40.000 km/h. Covering the remains of a whole, which they were once, by colored layers of different density.

Calcium in our bones, iron in blood, magnesium in the muscles- all this were born in nebulae through the thermonuclear furnaces of stars. We are the only beings known to us in the Universe, who are able to appreciate this act of creation. We are the children of nebulae...

Teun van der Zalm created this video, using computer modeling and algorithms of particle physics, based on scientific data. In a sense these are real nebulae, that we cannot see even with modern telescopes