M78

Object Type: Reflection Nebula
Scope: Orion 10" Newtonian; Exposure 155 minutes.

Messier 78 (NGC 2068) is the brightest reflection nebula in the sky, in Orion, about 1,600 light-years away and part of the vast Orion Molecular Cloud Complex. Discovered by Pierre Mechain in 1780, it glows not by its own emission but by starlight reflecting off dust, lit mainly by two 10th-magnitude stars embedded in it. The cloud is an active stellar nursery, home to dozens of young T Tauri variable stars and several Herbig-Haro objects, the jets of newborn stars.