Gas and Dust of the Lagoon Nebula.

This beautiful cosmic cloud is a popular stop on telescopic tours of the constellation Sagittarius . Eighteenth century cosmic tourist Charles Messier cataloged the bright nebula as M8 , while modern day astronomers recognize the Lagoon Nebula as an active stellar nursery about 5,000 light-years distant, in the direction of the center of our Milky Way Galaxy. Striking details can be traced through this remarkable picture , processed to remove stars and hence better reveal the Lagoon's range of filaments of glowing hydrogen gas , dark dust clouds, and the bright, turbulent hourglass region near the image center. This color composite view was recorded under dark skies near Sydney , Australia . At the Lagoon's estimated distance, the picture spans about 50 light-years.