A celestial shadow known as the Circinus West molecular cloud creeps across this image captured from Chile with the 570-megapixel Department of Energy–fabricated Dark Energy Camera—one of the most powerful digital cameras in the world. Within this stellar nursery’s opaque boundaries, infant stars ignite within cold, dense gas and dust, while outflows hurtle leftover material into space.
Circinus West: A dark nebula harboring a nest of newly formed stars
