A Thousand Tadpoles

Credit: NASA & ESA

A thou­sand cos­mic tad­poles appear to stream toward the cen­tral star of the Helix Neb­ula in this image from NASA’s Hub­ble Space Tele­scope.

This nearby plan­e­tary neb­ula shows a fine web of ray-like fea­tures in the blue and red ring of gas. A plan­e­tary neb­ula is the final stage of a Sun-like star’s life. As the star reaches the end of its life, it bal­loons to a red giant star. While this gives the star new life, pro­vid­ing extra energy to burn it’s hydro­gen and helium fuel for nuclear fusion, it can­not last for­ever. Even­tu­ally the star col­lapses on itself. The outer lay­ers of the star are thrown into space cre­at­ing a bub­ble around the star. In the case of the Helix Neb­ula we are peer­ing down a trillion-mile-long bar­rel of glow­ing gas.

Explore the comet-like tad­poles point­ing toward the super-hot white dwarf at the cen­ter of the neb­ula. These gas ten­ta­cles, float­ing in a sea of blue gas, form when the super-hot and fast solar wind plows into the cooler shells of dust and gas. Ultra­vi­o­let light from the hot cen­tral star causes the gas to glow.

NGC 7293 is one of the near­est plan­e­tary neb­ula to Earth at about 650 light-years away toward the con­stel­la­tion Aquar­ius.

Tomor­row, a closer look at the entire Helix Nebula.