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The Mark of a Dying Star
| Title |
The Mark of a Dying Star |
| Description |
Six hundred and fifty light-years away in the constellation Aquarius, a dead star about the size of Earth, is refusing to fade away peacefully. In death, it is spewing out massive amounts of hot gas and intense ultraviolet radiation, creating a spectacular object called a "planetary nebula." In this false-color image, NASA's Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes have teamed up to capture the complex structure of the object, called the Helix nebula, in unprecedented detail. The composite picture is made up of visible data from Hubble and infrared data from Spitzer. The dead star, called a white dwarf, can be seen at the center of the image as a white dot. All of the colorful gaseous material seen in the image was once part of the central star, but was lost in the death throes of the star on its way to becoming a white dwarf. The intense ultraviolet radiation being released by the white dwarf is heating and destabilizing the molecules in its surrounding environment, starting from the inside out. Like an electric stovetop slowly heating up from the center first, the hottest and most unstable gas molecules can be seen at the center of the nebula as wisps of blue. The transition to more stable and cooler molecules is clearly depicted as the color of the gas changes from very hot (blue) to hot (yellow) and warm (red). A striking feature of the Helix, first revealed by ground-based images, is its collection of thousands of filamentary structures, or strands of gas. In this image the filaments can be seen under the transparent blue gas as red lines radiating out from the center. Astronomers believe that the molecules in these filaments are able to stay cooler and more stable because dense clumps of materials are shielding them from ultraviolet radiation. This image is a composite showing ionized H-alpha (green) and O III (blue) gases from the Hubble Space Telescope, and molecular hydrogen (red) from Spitzer observations at 4.5 and 8.0 microns. |
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The Mark of a Dying Star
| Title |
The Mark of a Dying Star |
| Description |
Six hundred and fifty light-years away in the constellation Aquarius, a dead star about the size of Earth, is refusing to fade away peacefully. In death, it is spewing out massive amounts of hot gas and intense ultraviolet radiation, creating a spectacular object called a "planetary nebula." In this false-color image, NASA's Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes have teamed up to capture the complex structure of the object, called the Helix nebula, in unprecedented detail. The composite picture is made up of visible data from Hubble and infrared data from Spitzer. The dead star, called a white dwarf, can be seen at the center of the image as a white dot. All of the colorful gaseous material seen in the image was once part of the central star, but was lost in the death throes of the star on its way to becoming a white dwarf. The intense ultraviolet radiation being released by the white dwarf is heating and destabilizing the molecules in its surrounding environment, starting from the inside out. Like an electric stovetop slowly heating up from the center first, the hottest and most unstable gas molecules can be seen at the center of the nebula as wisps of blue. The transition to more stable and cooler molecules is clearly depicted as the color of the gas changes from very hot (blue) to hot (yellow) and warm (red). A striking feature of the Helix, first revealed by ground-based images, is its collection of thousands of filamentary structures, or strands of gas. In this image the filaments can be seen under the transparent blue gas as red lines radiating out from the center. Astronomers believe that the molecules in these filaments are able to stay cooler and more stable because dense clumps of materials are shielding them from ultraviolet radiation. This image is a composite showing ionized H-alpha (green) and O III (blue) gases from the Hubble Space Telescope, and molecular hydrogen (red) from Spitzer observations at 4.5 and 8.0 microns. |
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Looking Down a Barrel of Gas
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| Title |
Looking Down a Barrel of Gas at a Doomed Star |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. Astronomers using the Hubble telescope have obtained the sharpest view yet of a glowing loop of gas called the Ring Nebula (M57), first cataloged more than 200 years ago by French astronomer Charles Messier. The pictures reveal that the "Ring" is actually a cylinder of gas seen almost end-on. Such elongated shapes are common among other planetary nebulae, because thick disks of gas and dust form a waist around a dying star. This "waist" slows down the expansion of material ejected by the doomed object. The easiest escape route for this cast-off material is above and below the star. This photo reveals dark, elongated clumps of material embedded in the gas at the edge of the nebula, the dying central star is floating in a blue haze of hot gas. Read more: * Release Text [ http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/archive/releases/1999/01/text/ ] |
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Light and Shadow in the Cari
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| Title |
Light and Shadow in the Carina Nebula |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. Back to top [ #top ] |
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Hubble Takes a Close-up View
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| Title |
Hubble Takes a Close-up View of a Reflection Nebula in Orion |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. Back to top [ #top ] |
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Beauty in the Eye of Hubble
| Title |
Beauty in the Eye of Hubble |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. Back to top [ #top ] |
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Odd Couple Widely Separated
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| Title |
Odd Couple Widely Separated by Time and Space |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. Back to top [ #top ] |
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Hubble Astronomers Feast on
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| Title |
Hubble Astronomers Feast on an Interstellar Hamburger |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. Back to top [ #top ] |
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An Old Star Gives Up the Gho
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| Title |
An Old Star Gives Up the Ghost |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. Back to top [ #top ] |
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Hubble Photographs 'Double B
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| Title |
Hubble Photographs 'Double Bubble' in Neighboring Galaxy |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. Back to top [ #top ] |
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Iridescent Glory of Nearby P
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| Title |
Iridescent Glory of Nearby Planetary Nebula Showcased on Astronomy Day |
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Heritage Project Celebrates
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| Title |
Heritage Project Celebrates Five Years of Harvesting the Best Images from Hubble Space Telescope |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. Back to top [ #top ] |
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Hubble Snaps Images of a Pin
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| Title |
Hubble Snaps Images of a Pinwheel-Shaped Galaxy |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. This dramatic spiral galaxy is one of the latest viewed by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. Stunning details of the face-on spiral galaxy, cataloged as NGC 1309, are captured in this color image. NGC 1309 was home to supernova SN 2002fk, whose light reached Earth in September 2002. NGC 1309 resides 100 million light-years (30 Megaparsecs) from Earth. It is one of about 200 galaxies that make up the Eridanus group of galaxies. |
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Hubble Snaps Images of a Pin
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| Title |
Hubble Snaps Images of a Pinwheel-Shaped Galaxy |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. This dramatic spiral galaxy is one of the latest viewed by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. Stunning details of the face-on spiral galaxy, cataloged as NGC 1309, are captured in this color image. NGC 1309 was home to supernova SN 2002fk, whose light reached Earth in September 2002. NGC 1309 resides 100 million light-years (30 Megaparsecs) from Earth. It is one of about 200 galaxies that make up the Eridanus group of galaxies. |
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Hubble Snaps Images of a Pin
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| Title |
Hubble Snaps Images of a Pinwheel-Shaped Galaxy |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. This dramatic spiral galaxy is one of the latest viewed by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. Stunning details of the face-on spiral galaxy, cataloged as NGC 1309, are captured in this color image. NGC 1309 was home to supernova SN 2002fk, whose light reached Earth in September 2002. NGC 1309 resides 100 million light-years (30 Megaparsecs) from Earth. It is one of about 200 galaxies that make up the Eridanus group of galaxies. |
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Hubble Eyes Star Birth in th
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| Title |
Hubble Eyes Star Birth in the Extreme |
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The Colorful Demise of a Sun
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| Title |
The Colorful Demise of a Sun-like Star |
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A New Twist on an Old Nebula
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A New Twist on an Old Nebula |
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A New Twist on an Old Nebula
| Title |
A New Twist on an Old Nebula |
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Light Continues to Echo Thre
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| Title |
Light Continues to Echo Three Years After Stellar Outburst |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. Back to top [ #top ] |
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'Dancing with the Stars' Tak
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| Title |
'Dancing with the Stars' Takes on a Whole New Twist |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. Two galaxies perform an intricate dance in this new Hubble Space Telescope image. The galaxies, containing a vast number of stars, swing past each other in a graceful performance choreographed by gravity. The pair, known collectively as Arp 87, is one of hundreds of interacting and merging galaxies known in our nearby universe. Arp 87 is in the constellation Leo, the Lion, approximately 300 million light-years away from Earth. These observations were taken in February 2007 with the Wide Field Planetary Camera 2. |
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Hubble Celebrates 15th Anniv
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| Title |
Hubble Celebrates 15th Anniversary with Spectacular New Images |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. Back to top [ #top ] |
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Mars: Closest Approach 2007
| Title |
Mars: Closest Approach 2007 |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. NASA's Hubble Space Telescope took this close-up of the red planet Mars when it was just 55 million miles ? 88 million kilometers ? away. This color image was assembled from a series of exposures taken within 36 hours of the Mars closest approach with Hubble's Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2. Mars will be closest to Earth on December 18, at 11:45 p.m. Universal Time (6:45 p.m. EST). |
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Mars: Closest Approach 2007
| Title |
Mars: Closest Approach 2007 |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. NASA's Hubble Space Telescope took this close-up of the red planet Mars when it was just 55 million miles ? 88 million kilometers ? away. This color image was assembled from a series of exposures taken within 36 hours of the Mars closest approach with Hubble's Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2. Mars will be closest to Earth on December 18, at 11:45 p.m. Universal Time (6:45 p.m. EST). |
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Mars: Closest Approach 2007
| Title |
Mars: Closest Approach 2007 |
| General Information |
What is Hubble Heritage? A monthly showcase of new and archival Hubble images. Go to the Heritage site. NASA's Hubble Space Telescope took this close-up of the red planet Mars when it was just 55 million miles ? 88 million kilometers ? away. This color image was assembled from a series of exposures taken within 36 hours of the Mars closest approach with Hubble's Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2. Mars will be closest to Earth on December 18, at 11:45 p.m. Universal Time (6:45 p.m. EST). |
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