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Credit & Copyright: Raul Villaverde
Explanation:
Three thousand light-years away,
a dying star throws off shells of glowing gas.
This image from the
Hubble Space Telescope reveals the
Cat's Eye Nebula (NGC 6543), to be one of the most complex
planetary nebulae known.
Spanning half a
light-year,
the features seen in the
Cat's Eye
are so complex that astronomers suspect the bright
central object
may actually be a
binary star system.
The term planetary nebula, used to describe this
general class of objects, is
misleading.
Although these objects may appear round and
planet-like in small telescopes,
high resolution images with large telescopes reveal them to be
stars surrounded by
cocoons of gas blown off in the late stages of
stellar evolution.
Gazing into this Cat's Eye,
astronomers may well be seeing more than detailed structure,
they may be seeing the fate of our Sun, destined to enter its own
planetary nebula phase of evolution ... in about
5 billion years.
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NASA Web Site Statements, Warnings, and Disclaimers
NASA Official: Jay Norris. Specific rights apply.
A service of: LHEA at NASA / GSFC
& Michigan Tech. U.
Based on Astronomy Picture
Of the Day
Publications with keywords: Cat's Eye Nebula - planetary nebula
Publications with words: Cat's Eye Nebula - planetary nebula
See also:
- Planetary Nebula Abell 7
- The Medusa Nebula
- Jones Emberson 1
- APOD: 2024 February 12 Á HFG1 & Abell 6: Planetary Nebulae
- APOD: 2024 January 7 Á The Cats Eye Nebula in Optical and X-ray
- APOD: 2023 December 24 Á NGC 2440: Cocoon of a New White Dwarf
- APOD: 2023 October 3 Á MyCn 18: The Engraved Hourglass Planetary Nebula