Extended red emission and unidentified infrared bands in the galactic compact HII region Sh 152

We present visible and infrared images and low-dispersion visible spectra o f the galactic compact HII region Sh 152. The spatial distribution of the E xtended Red Emission (ERE) over the nebula is found to coincide with that o f the ionized hydrogen emission and to differ from that of the Unidentified InfraRed Bands (UIRBs) emission at 3.3 and 6.2 mum. This result and other considerations are in favour of grains as carriers of the ERE. It is shown that nanosized silicon particles could account for the ERE in terms of lumi nescence, an interpretation which, however, suffers from some limitations.