Post by glactus on Jan 19, 2009 12:33:57 GMT
The Eskimo nebula
The Eskimo Nebula (NGC 2392), is a bipolar double-shell planetary nebula. It was discovered by astronomer William Herschel in 1787. From the ground, it resembles a person's head surrounded by a parka hood. In 2000, the Hubble Space Telescope produced an image of it. From space, the nebula displays gas clouds so complex that they are not fully understood.
Its inner shell is bright and elliptical and marked on its south rim by two blister-like protrusions. Its outer shell is nearly circular and contains a set of complex low-ionization features. NGC 2392 lies about 3000 light-years away and is visible with a small telescope in the constellation of Gemini. Magnitude is 10.1
It is observed to have high-dispersion spectra of optical nebular lines which indicate a fast collimated outflow with a velocity along our line of sight of nearly 200 km/s producing dynamic interaction with nebular material.
It is surrounded by gas that composed the outer layers of a Sun-like star. The visible inner filaments are ejected by strong wind of particles from the central star. The outer disk contains unusual light-year long orange filaments.
Credits: This is a NASA/ESA/STSol image
