A star steals its partner’s spotlight in the Southern Ring Nebula

Also known as the Eight - Burst Nebula — or , if we want to be all boring and proficient , NGC 3132 — this cosmic beauty is located some 2,000 light - old age from Earth . It ’s not actually a regular nebula at all , but instead it ’s what ’s known as a wandering nebula , the result of a star dying and vent its remain accelerator pedal into the surrounding quad .

Unlike actual nebulae , which endure for eon and result to the geological formation of several new whizz , planetary nebulae are little , shorter - lived , and mark the goal of a star ’s liveliness . In this case , that star is the much dimmer of the two lights found at the center of this image . The Southern Ring Nebula skirt a binary star organization in which one of the two stars has already died , ejected its flatulence , and formed this unbelievable cosmic vista that will last for the next few thousand years . While that star now go a placid , nigh - eternal retirement as a faint , ultra - dumb ashen gnome asterisk , its cooperator wiz nonplus to bask in the glory , shine brightly in the midriff of a beautiful planetary nebula it played no part in make . I ’d regain this all deep unfair , if we were n’t , you know , talking about a couple stars here . NASA ’s Astronomy Photo of the Day internet site has some more detail :

nickname the Eight - Burst Nebula and the Southern Ring Nebula , the radiate gas originated in the outer layers of a ace like our Sun . In this recycle color photograph , the raging violet pool of light source seen smother this binary system is energized by the hot surface of the faint star . Although snap to search strange symmetries , it ’s the asymmetry that serve make this terrestrial nebula so intriguing . Neither the strange shape of the surrounding cooler case nor the structure and placements of the nerveless filamentary dust lanes running across NGC 3132 are well understood .

Hostinger Coupon Code 15% Off