March 30, 2011
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Hourglass
The Hourglass Nebula is a planetary nebula. When a star such as the Sun starts to die it becomes red and expands into a giant star. The old star will eventually eject its outer layers. The gaseous shell is illuminated by the dense stellar core, which is now exposed. We see the illuminated gas as a planetary nebula.
Image from NASA
Comments (2)
Very cool. The center looks like an eyeball.
I like it