EMBARGOED UNTIL:  2:00 P.M. (EDT)                        
                                                            JUNE 6, 1995

                                        PHOTO RELEASE NO.:  STSCI-PRC95-24a


                  HUBBLE VIEWS OF THREE STELLAR JETS

These NASA Hubble Space Telescope views of gaseous jets from 
three newly forming stars  show a new level of detail in the star 
formation process, and are helping to solve decade-old  questions 
about the secrets of star birth.  Jets are a common "exhaust product" 
of the dynamics of  star formation.  They are blasted away from a disk 
of gas and dust falling onto an embryonic star.

[upper left] - This view of a protostellar object called HH-30 reveals an 
edge-on disk of dust encircling a  newly forming star.   Light from the 
forming star illuminates the top and bottom surfaces of  the disk, 
making them visible, while the star itself is  hidden behind the 
densest parts of the  disk.  The reddish jet emanates from the 
inner region of the disk, and possibly directly from the star itself.   
Hubble's detailed view shows, for the first time, that the jet expands 
for several billion miles from the star, but then stays confined to a 
narrow beam.  The protostar is 450 light-years away in the 
constellation Taurus.

Credit:  C.  Burrows (STScI & ESA), the WFPC 2 Investigation 
              Definition Team, and NASA

[upper right] - This view of a different and more distant jet in object 
HH-34 shows a remarkable beaded structure.  Once thought to be a 
hydrodynamic effect (similar to shock diamonds in a jet aircraft 
exhaust), this structure is actually produced by a machine-gun-like 
blast of "bullets" of dense gas ejected from the star at speeds of 
one-half million miles per hour.  This structure suggests the star goes 
through episodic "fits" of construction where chunks of material fall 
onto the star from a surrounding disk.  The protostar is 1,500 light-
years away and in the vicinity of the Orion Nebula, a nearby star 
birth region.

Credit:  J. Hester (Arizona State University), the WFPC 2 Investigation 
         Definition Team, and NASA

[bottom] - This view of a three trillion mile-long jet called HH-47 reveals 
a very complicated jet pattern that indicates the star (hidden inside a 
dust cloud near the left edge of the image) might be wobbling, possibly 
caused by the gravitational pull of a companion star.  Hubble's detailed 
view shows that the jet has burrowed a cavity through the dense gas 
cloud and now travels at high speed into interstellar space.  Shock 
waves form when the jet collides with interstellar gas, causing the jet 
to glow.  The white filaments on the left reflect light from the obscured 
newborn star.  The HH-47 system is 1,500 light-years away, and lies at 
the edge of the Gum Nebula, possibly an ancient supernova remnant
which can be seen from Earth's southern hemisphere. 

Credit: J.  Morse/STScI, and NASA

The scale in the bottom left corner of each picture represents 93 billion miles, 
or 1,000 times the distance between Earth and the Sun.  All images were taken 
with the Wide Field  Planetary Camera 2 in visible light.  The HH designation 
stands for "Herbig-Haro" object -- the name for  bright patches of nebulosity 
which appear to be moving away from  associated protostars.