Raw image from the FLAMES instrument on the VLT

A raw image from the FLAMES instrument on the VLT: each of the 130 MEDUSA fibre is positioned on a different star in a cluster. The light from each fibre is dispersed by the GIRAFFE spectrograph, forming a spectrum that shows the intensity of the light for each constituent colour. On the image, each spectrum appears as an individual vertical line. Some are brighter as they correspond to brighter stars.