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Hubble offers dazzling Necklace Nebula

Date:
August 14, 2011
Source:
NASA
Summary:
A giant cosmic necklace glows brightly in this NASA Hubble Space Telescope image. The object, aptly named the Necklace Nebula, is a recently discovered planetary nebula, the glowing remains of an ordinary, Sun-like star. The nebula consists of a bright ring, measuring 12 trillion miles wide, dotted with dense, bright knots of gas that resemble diamonds in a necklace.
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A giant cosmic necklace glows brightly in this NASA Hubble Space Telescope image.

The object, aptly named the Necklace Nebula, is a recently discovered planetary nebula, the glowing remains of an ordinary, Sun-like star. The nebula consists of a bright ring, measuring 12 trillion miles wide, dotted with dense, bright knots of gas that resemble diamonds in a necklace.

A pair of stars orbiting close together produced the nebula, also called PN G054.2-03.4. About 10,000 years ago one of the aging stars ballooned to the point where it engulfed its companion star. The smaller star continued orbiting inside its larger companion, increasing the giant's rotation rate.

The bloated companion star spun so fast that a large part of its gaseous envelope expanded into space. Due to centrifugal force, most of the gas escaped along the star's equator, producing a ring. The embedded bright knots are dense gas clumps in the ring.

The pair is so close, only a few million miles apart, they appear as one bright dot in the center. The stars are furiously whirling around each other, completing an orbit in a little more than a day.

The Necklace Nebula is located 15,000 light-years away in the constellation Sagitta. In this composite image, taken on July 2, Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3 captured the glow of hydrogen (blue), oxygen (green), and nitrogen (red).

Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)

Hubble is a project of international cooperation between NASA and the European Space Agency. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., manages the telescope. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore conducts Hubble science operations. STScI is operated for NASA by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy Inc. in Washington.

For images and more information about Hubble, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/hubble


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Materials provided by NASA. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.


Cite This Page:

NASA. "Hubble offers dazzling Necklace Nebula." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 14 August 2011. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/08/110812094921.htm>.
NASA. (2011, August 14). Hubble offers dazzling Necklace Nebula. ScienceDaily. Retrieved March 18, 2024 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/08/110812094921.htm
NASA. "Hubble offers dazzling Necklace Nebula." ScienceDaily. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/08/110812094921.htm (accessed March 18, 2024).

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