Very young massive stars in the Small Magellanic Cloud, revealed by HST

High spatial resolution imaging with the Hubble Space Telescope allowed us to resolve the compact H II region N 81 lying in the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC). We show the presence of a tight cluster of newborn massive stars em bedded in this nebular "blob" of similar to 10 " across. This is the first time the stellar content and, internal morphology of such an object is unco vered. These are among the youngest massive stars in this galaxy accessible to direct observations at ultraviolet and optical wavelengths. Six of them are grouped in the core region of similar to 2 " diameter, with a pair of the main exciting stars in the very center separated by only 0." 27 or 0.08 pc. The images display violent phenomena such as stellar winds, shocks, io nization fronts, typical of turbulent starburst regions. Since the SMC is t he most metal-poor galaxy observable with very high angular resolution, the se observations provide important templates for studying star formation in the very distant metal-poor galaxies which populate the early Universe.