[ITAL]HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE[/ITAL][ITAL]Hubble Space Telescope[/ITAL] Observations of H[CLC]e[/CLC] 2-10: Outflows and Young Super–Star Clusters

We use Hubble Space Telescope (HST) WFPC2 optical images and GHRS ultraviolet spectroscopy to examine the recent star formation history and properties of the Wolf-Rayet galaxy He 2-10. The high spatial resolution afforded by HST has allowed the identification of a number of starburst knots, or "super–star clusters" (SSCs). The spatial morphology newly revealed by these HST images exhibits a prominent dust lane between the starburst regions known as A and B and a spur of material to the northwest of the nuclear region. Broadband photometry of the SSCs confirms that these objects have ages as young as a few Myr and masses up to 105 M☉. Narrowband Hα photometry of the SSCs indicates large equivalent widths for nearly half of them, consistent with ages less than 10 Myr. Since an appreciable fraction of SSCs are this young, the star formation history necessarily must be strongly peaked and not continuous.