This photo was taken by the European Southern Observatory. I have enhanced it for artistic effect. The European Southern Observatory (ESO, formally the European Organisation for Astronomical Research in the Southern Hemisphere; Observatoire europ austral in French) is a 15-nation intergovernmental research organisation for astronomy. Created in 1962, ESO has provided astronomers with state-of-the-art research facilities and access to the southern sky. The organisation employs about 730 staff members and receives annual member state contributions of approximately 143 million. Its observatories are located in northern Chile. ESO has built and operated some of the largest and most technologically-advanced telescopes in the world. These include the New Technology Telescope (NTT) (which pioneered active optics technology) and the Very Large Telescope (VLT), which consists of four 8-metre-class telescopes and four 1.8-metre auxiliary telescopes. Ongoing ESO projects include the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) and the European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT). The Omega Nebula, also known as the Swan Nebula, Checkmark Nebula, Lobster Nebula, and the Horseshoe Nebula (catalogued as Messier 17 or M17 and as NGC 6618) is an H II region in the 0constellation Sagittarius. It was discovered by Philippe Loys de Chéseaux in 1745. Charles Messier catalogued it in 1764. It is located in the rich starfields of the Sagittarius area of the Milky Way. The Omega Nebula is between 5,000 and 6,000 light-years from Earth and it spans some 15 light-years in diameter. The cloud of interstellar matter of which this nebula is a part is roughly 40 light-years in diameter and has a mass of 30,000 solar masses. The total mass of the Omega Nebula is an estimated 800 solar masses. It is considered one of the brightest and most massive star-forming regions of our galaxy. Its local geometry is similar to the Orion Nebula except that it is viewed edge-on rather than face-on. An open clus