Ghost ball - farewell of a dying star

Ghost ball - farewell of a dying star

When a star-like star squanders its resources and begins to fade away, violent stellar winds tear it into pieces, throwing a huge amount of stellar matter into space. As a result, a planetary nebula or giant bubble of expanding gas appears, showing a beautiful star farewell.

A particularly sophisticated planetary nebula seen on the image of the large ESO telescope is called ESO 378-1. She was little known until the moment when a powerful telescope located in the northern part of Chile did not enlarge the resulting image.

It is also called the South Owl Nebula. This planetary nebula lies about four light-years from its visual cousin, the Owl Nebula, in the northern constellation of Hydra. A phenomenon like the planetary nebula is very short-lived. When the star is 8 times lighter than our Sun, the star begins to fade, the huge gas cloud first expands in interstellar space, the bright core of the star remains in its center, emitting a powerful stream of ultraviolet color that makes the cloud shine.

When the nebula disappears, the white dwarf will remain alone, glowing and slowly cooling for a few billion years.

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