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The Tulip nebula with the Cygnus X-1 bow shock, Francesco Meschia
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The Tulip nebula with the Cygnus X-1 bow shock

The Tulip nebula with the Cygnus X-1 bow shock, Francesco Meschia
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The Tulip nebula with the Cygnus X-1 bow shock

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Description

The Tulip nebula is a well-known emission nebula in an H-II region found along the “neck” of the Swan, Cygnus. Next to it lies the galactic X-ray source Cygnus X-1, which is though to be a binary system formed by the star HD 226868 and a compact companion, most likely a 15-solar-mass black hole. The matter falling onto the compact object forms an accretion disk, and dissipates its gravitational potential energy in the form of two jets of accelerated particles, traveling at relativistic speeds. One of the jets meets a region of denser interstellar medium, and forms a bow shock that glows faintly in O-III and H-alpha light, well visible in the image.

About the image: SHO data processed using a dynamic narrowband palette technique inspired by thecoldestnights.com, with stars from RGB data.

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    The Tulip nebula with the Cygnus X-1 bow shock, Francesco Meschia
    Original
    The Tulip nebula with the Cygnus X-1 bow shock, Francesco Meschia
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Description: Closer crop to highlight the Cygnus X-1 bow shock (the faint blue arc on the right of the bright nebula)

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The Tulip nebula with the Cygnus X-1 bow shock, Francesco Meschia