NASA Finds a Cosmic ‘Lightsaber’ Far, Far Away

With the release of The Force Awakens, it feels like Star Wars has been everywhere this week—and now it’s even popping up in space, NASA says.

NASA released video from the Hubble Space Telescope of “what looks like a cosmic, double-bladed lightsaber” on Thursday. The photographs show a newborn star, “partially obscured by a dark, Jedi-like cloak of dust” inside the Milky Way.

“Science fiction has been an inspiration to generations of scientists and engineers, and the film series Star Wars is no exception,” John Grunsfeld, astronaut and associate administrator for the NASA Science Mission directorate, said in the Star Wars-themed release. “There is no stronger case for the motivational power of real science than the discoveries that come from the Hubble Space Telescope as it unravels the mysteries of the universe.”

The Hubble Telescope had to peer 1,350 light-years away to find the new star, located in the Orion B molecular cloud complex.