Celestial hemisphere:  Southern  ·  Constellation: Aquarius (Aqr)  ·  Contains:  Helix Nebula  ·  NGC 7293
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The Helix Nebula (NGC 7293) in Narrow Band, Ian Parr
The Helix Nebula (NGC 7293) in Narrow Band
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The Helix Nebula (NGC 7293) in Narrow Band

Getting plate-solving status, please wait...
The Helix Nebula (NGC 7293) in Narrow Band, Ian Parr
The Helix Nebula (NGC 7293) in Narrow Band
Powered byPixInsight

The Helix Nebula (NGC 7293) in Narrow Band

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Description

The Helix Nebula (NGC 7293) is located in the constellation Aquarius and is one of the closest planetary nebula to the Earth at a distance of around 655 light-years.
It has an apparent magnitude of 7.6 and is about 25 arcminutes in size. The Helix Nebula has sometimes been referred to as the Eye of God or the Eye of Sauron.
The remnant central stellar core of the planetary nebula is destined to become a white dwarf star and the glow of the central star is so energetic that it causes the previously expelled gases to brightly fluoresce.

I last imaged it in the first week of September 2021 but the weather now is rubbish (again) so I thought I would revisit the data using new techniques and tools, including NormalizeScaleGradient and GeneralisedHyperbolicStretch in Pixinsight  (which are brilliant).

It is now well placed so I plan to revisit it in RGB on the next new moon assuming La Nina takes a break.

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The Helix Nebula (NGC 7293) in Narrow Band, Ian Parr