Haunting patterns within planetary nebula NGC 6543 [ http://nineplanets.org/twn/n6543x.html ] readily suggest its popular moniker -- the Cat's Eye nebula. In 1995, a stunning false-color optical image from the Hubble Space Telescope [ http://oposite.stsci.edu/pubinfo/PR/95/01.html ] detailed the swirls of this glowing nebula [ http://www.seds.org/billa/twn/types.html ], known to be the gaseous shroud expelled from a dying sun-like star [ http://observe.ivv.nasa.gov/nasa/space/stellardeath/ stellardeath_opening.html ] about 3,000 light-years from Earth. This composite picture combines the famous Hubble image with new x-ray data [ http://chandra.harvard.edu/xray_astro/ history.html ] from the orbiting Chandra Observatory [ http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/cycle1/1220/index.html ] and reveals surprisingly intense x-ray emission indicating the presence of extremely hot gas. X-ray emission is shown as blue-purple hues superimposed on red and green optical emission. The nebula's central star itself is clearly immersed in the multimillion degree, x-ray emitting gas. Other pockets of x-ray hot gas seem to be bordered by cooler gas emitting strongly at optical wavelengths, a clear indication that expanding hot gas is sculpting the visible Cat's Eye [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap990916.html ] filaments and structures. Gazing into the Cat's Eye, astronomers see the fate of our sun [ http://www.astro.washington.edu/balick/WFPC2/ ], destined to enter its own planetary nebula phase [ http://ad.usno.navy.mil/pne/gallery.html ] of evolution ... in about 5 billion years [ http://chandra.harvard.edu/xray_sources/white_dwarfs.html ].
Hubble Probes the Complex Hi
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Title
Hubble Probes the Complex History of a Dying Star
General Information
What is an American Astronomical Society Meeting release? A major news announcement issued at an American Astronomical Society meeting, the premier astronomy conference. This Hubble telescope image shows one of the most complex planetary nebulae ever seen, NGC 6543, nicknamed the "Cat's Eye Nebula." Hubble reveals surprisingly intricate structures including concentric gas shells, jets of high-speed gas, and unusual shock-induced knots of gas. Estimated to be 1,000 years old, the nebula is a visual "fossil record" of the dynamics and late evolution of a dying star. A preliminary interpretation suggests that the object might be a double-star system. The dynamical effects of two stars orbiting one another most easily explains the intricate structures, which are much more complicated than features seen in most planetary nebulae. The two stars are too close together to be individually resolved by Hubble and instead appear as a single point of light at the center of the nebula.
The Cat's Eye Nebula
Title
The Cat's Eye Nebula
Full Description
This NASA Hubble Space Telescope image shows one of the most complex planetary nebulae ever seen, NGC 6543, nicknamed the "Cat's Eye Nebula." Hubble reveals surprisingly intricate structures including concentric gas shells, jets of high-speed gas and unusual shock-induced knots of gas. Estimated to be 1,000 years old, the nebula is a visual "fossil record" of the dynamics and late evolution of a dying star. A preliminary interpretation suggests that the star might be a double-star system. The suspected companion star also might be responsible for a pair of high-speed jets of gas that lie at right angles to this equatorial ring. If the companion were pulling in material from a neighboring star, jets escaping along the companion's rotation axis could be produced. These jets would explain several puzzling features along the periphery of the gas lobes. Like a stream of water hitting a sand pile, the jets compress gas ahead of them, creating the "curlicue" features and bright arcs near the outer edge of the lobes. The twin jets are now pointing in different directions than these features. This suggests the jets are wobbling, or precessing, and turning on and off episodically. This color picture, taken with the Wide Field Planetary Camera-2, is a composite of three images taken at different wavelengths. (red, hydrogen-alpha, blue, neutral oxygen, 6300 angstroms, green, ionized nitrogen, 6584 angstroms). The image was taken on September 18, 1994. NGC 6543 is 3,000 light- years away in the northern constellation Draco. The term planetary nebula is a misnomer, dying stars create these cocoons when they lose outer layers of gas. The process has nothing to do with planet formation, which is predicted to happen early in a star's life.
Date
09/18/1994
NASA Center
Hubble Space Telescope Center
Halo of the Cat's Eye
Title
Halo of the Cat's Eye
Explanation
The Cat's Eye Nebula [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap020324.html ] (NGC 6543) is one of the best known planetary nebulae in the sky [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap011003.html ]. Its haunting symmetries [ http://www.cybercom.net/~klb/ tiger.html ] are seen in the very central region of this stunning false-color picture, processed to reveal the enormous but extremely faint halo of gaseous material, over three light-years across, which surrounds the brighter, familiar planetary nebula. Made with data from the Nordic Optical Telescope [ http://www.not.iac.es/ ] in the Canary Islands, the composite picture shows emission from nitrogen atoms as red and oxygen atoms as green and blue shades. Planetary nebulae [ http://www.noao.edu/jacoby/pn_gallery.html ] have long been appreciated as a final phase in the life [ http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/teachers/lifecycles/ stars.html ] of a sun-like star. Only much more recently however, have some planetaries been found to have halos [ http://www.ing.iac.es/~rcorradi/HALOES/ ] like this one, likely formed of material shrugged off during earlier active episodes in the star's evolution. While the planetary nebula phase [ http://www.astro.washington.edu/balick/WFPC2/ ] is thought to last for around 10,000 years, astronomers estimate the age of the outer filamentary portions of this halo to be 50,000 to 90,000 years.
Cat's Eye
Title
Cat's Eye
Explanation
Staring across interstellar space, the alluring Cat's Eye [ http://heritage.stsci.edu/2004/27/ ] nebula lies three thousand light-years from Earth. A classic planetary nebula [ http://www.seds.org/messier/planetar.html ], the Cat's Eye (NGC 6543) represents a final, brief yet glorious phase [ http://www.astro.washington.edu/balick/WFPC2/ ] in the life of a sun-like star. This nebula's dying central star may have produced the simple, outer pattern of dusty concentric shells [ http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0401056 ] by shrugging [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap011003.html ] off outer layers in a series of regular convulsions. But the formation of the beautiful, more complex inner structures is not well understood [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap010111.html ]. Seen so clearly in this sharp Hubble [ http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/newsdesk/archive/ releases/2004/27/fastfacts/ ] Space Telescope image, the truly cosmic eye is over half a light-year across. Of course, gazing into the Cat's Eye [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap031101.html ], astronomers may well be seeing the fate of our sun, destined to enter its own planetary nebula phase [ http://chandra.harvard.edu/xray_sources/ white_dwarfs.html ] of evolution ... in about 5 billion years [ http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/newsdesk/archive/ releases/1997/38/astrofile/ ].
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