NGC 1999

NGC 1999, also known as ‘The Cosmic Keyhole’ is a reflection nebula in the LDN 1641 portion of the Orion A Giant Molecular Cloud. It lies at a distance of 1350 light years from Earth. It shines from the light of the variable star V380 Orionis, a young multiple star system.
In the centre of the nebula is a dark patch, originally thought to be a Bok globule - a dense, cold cloud of gas, molecules, and cosmic dust that blots out background light. Follow-up observations, however, using a collection of telescopes revealed that the dark parch is actually a hole or cavity in the nebula excavated by protostellar jets from V380.
The area around NGC 1999 also contains a number of Herbig-Haro objects, bright patches of nebulosity associate with newborn stars.