The Dark Seahorse Nebula

Barnard 150 is a dense dark nebula — a cold, opaque cloud of dust and molecular gas — in Cepheus, roughly 1,200 light-years away. Unlike emission or reflection nebulae it produces no light of its own; it is visible only as a silhouette against the star-rich background of the Milky Way. The elongated seahorse shape traces a dense filament of interstellar dust where future generations of stars are slowly condensing under gravity.