Starfish Dragonfly

Credit: ESA/Hub­ble, NASA and R. Sahai

A star near­ing the end of its life unfurls wings of gas and dust resem­bling a drag­on­fly or starfish in this image from the NASA/ESA Hub­ble Space Telescope.

Explore the glim­mer­ing shells of gas of the pro­to­plan­e­tary neb­ula IRAS 19024+0044. What shapes and sto­ries do you see in this image? Leave a note below. Five blue wings, or lobes, are seen in the image.

Astronomers study pro­to­plan­e­tary neb­u­lae because they offer a glimpse at how stars like our own Sun end their lives. When sun-like stars run out of the hydro­gen fuel that pow­ers fusion in their cores, they puff up, blow­ing bub­bles of mate­r­ial out into space. At first, this beau­ti­ful cloud of gas and dust only reflects light from its par­ent star. Even­tu­ally the cool gas and dust is heated and ion­ized by the intense ultra­vi­o­let radi­a­tion stream­ing from the now exposed core of the star. Astronomers call this star a white dwarf. The glow­ing neb­ula around the star has become a plan­e­tary nebula.

Hub­ble cap­tured IRAS 19204+0044 in a rare and short-lived period of its life. Astronomers don’t know for sure what causes the lobes to be uneven. Chang­ing jets or explo­sive bub­bles from the star are a cou­ple of possibilities.

IRAS 19204+0044 is found about 11,000 light-years from Earth toward the con­stel­la­tion of Aquila, the Eagle.