The Hubble Space Telescope snapped this image of the planetary nebula, cataloged as NGC 6302, with the Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3). More widely called the Bug Nebula or the Butterfly Nebula, NGC 6302 looks like a fragile butterfly, but it is far from serene.
What Is a Planetary Nebula?
A planetary nebula is a region of cosmic gas and dust formed from the cast-off external layers of a dying star. Despite their name, planetary nebulae really have nothing to do with worlds.
Intermediate-mass stars have a mass in between 80% and 800% of the Suns mass. When these types of stars die, they broaden to form red giants. The dying star will continue to expel gas, while concurrently the remaining core of the star agreements and temporarily begins to radiate energy again. This energy causes the expelled gas to ionize, indicating that the atoms and molecules in the gas become charged and begin to give off light. The cast-off glowing gas is referred to as a planetary nebula.
This suggests that planetary nebulae are classified as emission nebulae, and are entirely unassociated to planets. The misnomer came about because of a historic misclassification. 250 years ago, astronomers thought they were taking a look at gas planets when they observed the colorful spectacle of planetary nebulae through their less powerful telescopes.
The Hubble Space Telescope snapped this image of the planetary nebula, cataloged as NGC 6302, with the Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3). More widely called the Bug Nebula or the Butterfly Nebula, NGC 6302 looks like a fragile butterfly, but it is far from peaceful. Utilizing Hubble, astronomers caught an unusual glimpse of the nebula Hen 3-1357, nicknamed the Stingray nebula, fading precipitously over just the previous two years. The Hubble Space Telescope image revealed a fine web of filamentary bicycle-spoke features embedded in the colorful red and blue gas ring that is one of the nearest planetary nebulae to Earth. The telescope also showed its complete variety of imaging abilities with 2 brand-new images of planetary nebulae in 2020, of NGC 6302, dubbed the Butterfly Nebula, and NGC 7027.
Planetary nebulae just last for about 20,000 years, making them a very short-lived part of the outstanding life process.
A planetary nebula is an area of cosmic gas and dust formed from the cast-off outer layers of a dying star. In spite of their name, planetary nebulae have absolutely nothing to do with worlds. Credit: ESA/Hubble (M. Kornmesser).
Throughout the years, the Hubble Space Telescope has studied and imaged varying shapes and colors of these complex planetary nebulae, the different colors occurring from different, frequently recently developed, chemical components, showing that the lasts of the lives of stars are more complicated than as soon as thought. You can explore Hubbles incredible collection of planetary nebula images here.
Utilizing Hubble, astronomers caught an uncommon glance of the nebula Hen 3-1357, nicknamed the Stingray nebula, fading precipitously over simply the previous twenty years. Although deep space is continuously altering, many procedures are too sluggish to be observed within a human life-span. Nevertheless, the Stingray Nebula offered scientists an unique chance to observe the advancement of a system in real-time. Images captured by Hubble in 2016, when compared to Hubble images taken in 1996, revealed a nebula that has actually drastically dimmed in brightness and altered shape.
Credit: ESA/Hubble, NASA, ESA and the Hubble SM4 ERO Team.
To commemorate Astronomy Day in 2003, astronomers unveiled one of the largest and most in-depth celestial images to date of the Helix Nebula. The Hubble Space Telescope image revealed a great web of filamentary bicycle-spoke functions embedded in the colorful red and blue gas ring that is one of the nearest planetary nebulae to Earth.
Hubbles research studies of a large number of planetary nebulae have also revealed that rings, such as those seen around the Cats Eye Nebula, are far more typical than previously thought and have been found in at least a third of all planetary nebulae.
The telescope also showed its full variety of imaging abilities with 2 brand-new images of planetary nebulae in 2020, of NGC 6302, dubbed the Butterfly Nebula, and NGC 7027. Both are among the dustiest planetary nebulae understood and both consist of abnormally large masses of gas, which made them an intriguing pair for research study in parallel by researchers. The Hubble images revealed in vibrant information how both nebulae are splitting themselves apart on extremely brief timescales– permitting astronomers to see changes over the previous couple of decades.