保护地球，探索宇宙，发现文明
2022年12月26日 NGC 6164: Dragon’s Egg Nebula and Halo Image Credit & Copyright: Russell Croman Explanation: The star at the center created everything. Known as the Dragon’s Egg, this star — a rare, hot, luminous O-type star some 40 times as massive as the Sun — created not only the complex nebula (NGC 6164) that immediately surround...
2022年12月7日 NGC 7293: The Helix Nebula Image Credit & Copyright: Tommaso Stella Explanation: A mere seven hundred light years from Earth, toward the constellation Aquarius, a sun-like star is dying. The dying star’s last few thousand years have produced the Helix Nebula (NGC 7293), a well studied and nearby example of a Planetary Nebula, typical of...
2022年7月14日 Webb’s Southern Ring Nebula Image Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, NIRCam Explanation: Cataloged as NGC 3132 the Southern Ring Nebula is a planetary nebula, the death shroud of a dying sun-like star some 2,500 light-years from Earth. Composed of gas and dust the stunning cosmic landscape is nearly half a light-year in diameter, explored in unp...
2022年5月21日 Planetary Nebula Abell 7 Image Credit & Copyright: Donald Waid, Ron Dilulio Explanation: Very faint planetary nebula Abell 7 is some 1,800 light-years distant, just south of Orion in planet Earth’s skies in the constellation Lepus, The Hare. Surrounded by Milky Way stars and near the line-of-sight to distant background galaxies, its gen...
2022年3月25日 The Medusa Nebula Image Credit & Copyright: Damien Cannane Explanation: Braided and serpentine filaments of glowing gas suggest this nebula’s popular name, The Medusa Nebula. Also known as Abell 21, this Medusa is an old planetary nebula some 1,500 light-years away in the constellation Gemini. Like its mythological namesake, the nebula ...
2021年11月07日 The Cat’s Eye Nebula in Optical and X-ray Image Credit: NASA, ESA, Hubble Legacy Archive; Chandra X-ray Obs.; Processing & Copyright: Rudy Pohl Explanation: To some it looks like a cat’s eye. To others, perhaps like a giant cosmic conch shell. It is actually one of brightest and most highly detailed planetary nebula known, compose...
2021年10月14日 NGC 7293: The Helix Nebula Image Credit & Copyright: Ignacio Diaz Bobillo Explanation: A mere seven hundred light years from Earth, toward the constellation Aquarius, a sun-like star is dying. Its last few thousand years have produced the Helix Nebula (NGC 7293), a well studied and nearby example of a Planetary Nebula, typical of this final ...
2021年7月12日 M27: The Dumbbell Nebula Image Credit & Copyright: Bray Falls & Keith Quattrocchi Explanation: What will become of our Sun? The first hint of our Sun’s future was discovered inadvertently in 1764. At that time, Charles Messier was compiling a list of diffuse objects not to be confused with comets. The 27th object on Messier’s...
2021年04月25日 Planetary Nebula Mz3: The Ant Nebula Image Credit: R. Sahai (JPL) et al., Hubble Heritage Team, ESA, NASA Explanation: Why isn’t this ant a big sphere? Planetary nebula Mz3 is being cast off by a star similar to our Sun that is, surely, round. Why then would the gas that is streaming away create an ant-shaped nebula that is distinctly not r...
2021年03月26日 The Medusa Nebula Image Credit & Copyright: Josep Drudis Explanation: Braided and serpentine filaments of glowing gas suggest this nebula’s popular name, The Medusa Nebula. Also known as Abell 21, this Medusa is an old planetary nebula some 1,500 light-years away in the constellation Gemini. Like its mythological namesake, the nebula i...