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Refelction nebulae are generally composed more of dust than of gas.
In this case, the dust reglects the light of the bright blue young
stars in the central region; it redirects the light toward our eyes.
Because the grains of dust are small, and some of the blue light is
not redirected toward us, there must be nearby very bright stars to
see a reflection nebulae. The color of light we see is blue because
it comes from the bright, young stars which are blue.
But we know that stars are blackbodies, which means they radiate at
all wavelenghts of the electromagnetic spectrum. So there is some red
light from the stars. Why doesn't the reflection nebula appear red?
It turns out that red light is not as easily redirected as blue light.
Redder wavelengths of light will pass through the gas and dust without
begin redirected. In fact this explains why, when we look at the star
in our example, it would appear redder than it really is - if we could
see it without the gas and dust around it. Some of the blue light
doesn't reach our eyes (or the photographs) because it has been
redirected. The red light, on the other hand, has no trouble. So the
relative amount of red and blue light have changed.
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The source of this material is Windows to the Universe, at http://www.windows.ucar.edu/ at the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR). ©1995-1999, 2000 The Regents of the University of Michigan; ©2000-01 University Corporation for Atmospheric Research. All Rights Reserved. Site policies and disclaimer