Resembling the petals of a flower, "fingers" of molecular hydrogen, formed as gas ejected from a young star (or stars) collides with gas in the parent cloud, is captured by the Near-Infrared Camera and MultiObject Spectrometer (NICMOS) aboard the Hubble Space Telescope. In this false-color image, red represents molecular hydrogen, green shows atomic hydrogen excited by ultraviolet light from hot stars (just below the edge of the image) near the cloud surface, and blue traces starlight emitted directly by stars (small blue spots) or reflected from dust grains in the cloud (extended blue patches). This image was presented to the American Astronomical Society in San Diego, CA, on June 8, 1998. PHOTO CREDIT: Ed Erickson, Angie Schultz, Sean Colgan, and NASA

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