By NASAs Goddard Space Flight Center
November 9, 2021
Hubble Space Telescope picture of planetary nebula NGC 1535, which is also known as Cleopatras Eye. Credit: NASA, ESA, and H. Bond and R. Ciardullo (Pennsylvania State University), et. al.; Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America).
Cleopatras Eye, or NGC 1535, is a planetary nebula in the constellation Eridanus. This nebula has an unusual structure that is similar to the better-known NGC 2392, with an outer region and a brighter inner.
A planetary nebula forms when a star roughly the size of our Sun dies, exhaling its external layers into area as the core turns into a white dwarf star. Through early telescopes these things resembled worlds– providing their name– but planetary nebulae are unrelated to real worlds.
Hubble observed this nebula as part of a study of over 100 planetary nebulae with neighboring stars. The distance of the stars showed a possible gravitational connection in between the close-by stars and the central stars of the nebulae. Observations of the range between NGC 1535s central star and its possible buddy suggest that Cleopatras Eye is indeed part of a gravitationally bound binary star system.