At visible wavelengths, the Taurus Molecular Cloud appears as a dark nebula of dust and gas. But longer wavelengths have pierced the veil to reveal a bustling stellar nursery. At some 450 light-years away, it's one of the nearest such regions, home to at least 250 infant stars. The James Webb Space Telescope has turned its infrared eyes on one of these, designated L1527. This protostar is a hot blob of gas that has only 20% to 40% the Sun's mass. At only about 100,000 years old, it hasn't yet begun fusion in its core. It's still feeding on the cloud around it, which funnels gas and dust into a disk that's visible as a dark line across the middle of the image. That line is a few hundred astronomical…
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Australian Sky & Telescope (Digital) - 1 Issue, March 2023