Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Sagitta (Sge)
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IC4997 RGB, andrea tasselli
IC4997 RGB
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IC4997 RGB

Getting plate-solving status, please wait...
IC4997 RGB, andrea tasselli
IC4997 RGB
Powered byPixInsight

IC4997 RGB

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Description

IC4997 is nominally listed as 4" in diameter in some surveys but most likely around 2" (based on Hubble imagery). No one (amateur) has resolved the structure (despite some claims to the contrary) nor I think it can ever be done. This is one of the "stellar" PN which happen to be in the combined NGC and IC catalogs and as such entered in my personal bucket list. At the time no one ever imaged this bi-polar PN in full RGB colour so this one is, or was, a first. The colour should be off-white as the vast majority of the emission is in the OIII band but the brightness of the central star overwhelms the nebula. For such a nondescript little thing reams of published scientific papers exist and apparently this is just a squealing baby in the cosmic scale of things, a budding PN caught in the act of starting its expansion, possible only few tens of years old.

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