An amazing image showing a collection of stars and nebulae has been released by the European Southern Observatory. In the colourful picture star clusters, emission nebulae and active star-forming regions are seen at a distance of about 4,000 light-years. The image is the most detailed view of this part of the sky, the southern constellation of Ara (The Altar), ever taken. Scroll down for a video zooming in to the region . This image, taken by OmegaCAM on the VLT Survey Telescope at Paranal Observatory, shows a section of the Ara OB1 stellar association. In the centre of the image is the young open cluster NGC 6193, and to the right is the emission nebula NGC 6188, illuminated by the ionising radiation emitted by the brightest nearby stars . The image was created using the Very Large Telescope (VLT) at the European Southern Observatory’s (ESO’s) Paranal Observatory in Chile. At the centre of the image is an open star cluster called NGC 6193, which contains about 30 bright stars. A nebula, which comes from the Latin word for ‘cloud’, is a region of gas and dust in space. Some are the remains of dead stars that have expelled their gas, whereas others are regions where new stars are being formed. They come in a variety of shapes and sizes. There are four main types: planetary nebulae, reflection nebulae, absorption nebulae and emission nebulae. The two brightest are extremely hot and giant stars, which provide illumination for a nearby emission nebula called the Rim Nebula, or NGC 6188. This includes the extremely bright star HD 150136, at the centre, which is likely to actually be a pair of stars that are extremely close to each other. The reddish glow comes from giant clouds of hydrogen, which are lit up by the intense ultraviolet light from the cluster of hot young stars in the middle of the picture. They are spread over a region known as the Ara OB1 association, which continues outside the limits of this picture - and is a region of similar hot and bright stars that formed at the same time. The blue colouration is scattered light from these stars, while the brown darker features are huge clouds of cosmic dust, which absorb the light. The Rim Nebula is towards the right-centre of the image, and is the prominent wall of dark and bright clouds that provides a border to an active star-forming region called RCW 108. The nebula is about 300 light-years long and contains young stars that formed as recently as a few million years ago - a blink of an eye in cosmic terms. At the centre of the image is an open star cluster called NGC 6193, while on the right is the Rim Nebula. Move the slider to see labels for the image . The image was taken using the Very Large Telescope (VLT), shownn, at the European Southern Observatory’s  Paranal Observatory in Chile . The image is the most detailed view of this part of the sky so far, in the southern constellation of Ara (The Altar), shown here . The entire image was created by combining more than 500 individual pictures taken through four colour filters with the VLT Survey Telescope. The total exposure time was more than 56 hours. ‘A great deal of computer work was needed to combine the many individual pictures and make this detailed colour view from them,’ a spokesperson for the ESO told MailOnline. ‘This is a great image for studying what goes on in star formation regions, and how the young stars interact with their surroundings - and also trigger the next generation of star birth.’
A telescope array in Chile has captured the most detailed image ever made of a portion of the southern sky . In the image can be seen clusters, star-forming regions and nebulae, including the 300 light-year-long NGC 6188 . Young and hot stars are also seen at the centre of the composite image, which combines 500 different pictures . 'This is a great image for studying what goes on in star formation regions,' an ESO spokesperson told MailOnline .