Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Lyra (Lyr)  ·  Contains:  IC 1296  ·  M 57  ·  NGC 6720  ·  Ring nebula in Lyra
Ring Nebula, John Corban
Ring Nebula
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Ring Nebula

Ring Nebula, John Corban
Ring Nebula
Powered byPixInsight

Ring Nebula

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Description

Messier 57 (NGC 6720) is the famous Ring Nebula. It is a showpiece in the northern hemisphere summer sky, and often regarded as the prototype of all planetary nebulae. These objects are the remains of sunlike stars which have blown away their outer envelopes, leaving planet-sized white dwarfs at their centers.

Recent research has confirmed that M 57 is actually a torus of light-emitting material, not a spherical or ellipsoidal shell. Its overall shape might even be that of a cylinder or hourglass, which we happen to view at an angle of about 30° from one pole. In other words, we are looking down the mouth of a tunnel of gas whose symmetry axis is pointing toward the Earth, giving it a ring-like appearance.

~ from SkySafari

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Ring Nebula, John Corban