A new image of the Crystal Ball Nebula has revealed a dazzling celestial object—a dying star resembling a crystal ball, UNN reports, citing CNN.
Details
Scientists captured the image of NGC 1514, dubbed the "Crystal Ball" nebula, using the Gemini Multi-Object Spectrograph. This instrument is mounted on the Gemini North telescope, located on Mauna Kea in Hawaii, USA.
Researchers set aside several hours in the evenings to observe the sky and discover something spectacular, said astronomer Travis Rector.
"It's a way to show people how amazing our universe is, so the nebula wasn't a scientific target; it was chosen simply because it looks really cool," said Rector, a member of the NOIRLab team that took the image. NOIRLab is short for the National Science Foundation's National Optical-Infrared Astronomy Research Laboratory.
The image shows striking details of the planetary nebula, located approximately 1,500 light-years from Earth in the constellation Taurus. A light-year is the distance light travels in one year, which is 9.46 trillion kilometers—meaning the light captured in the image was emitted about 1,500 years ago.
Planetary nebulae got their name because they resemble planets when observed through a small telescope. These celestial objects form when dying stars shed their outer layers. As a result of this shedding, a region of dust and gas forms around the star's core—a white dwarf.
"They have unique shapes. They are truly extraordinarily beautiful objects, and they often have very complex but symmetrical structures," said Rector, a professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Alaska Anchorage.
The stunning image allows scientists to observe how a binary star system changes when one star reaches the end of its life before the other.