A breathtaking new image of the butterfly-like Twin Jet Nebula taken by the Hubble Space Telescope reveals its shells and knots of expanding gas in detail.
The image displays two "iridescent lobes" of material that expand outwards from the blazing star system, the European Space Agency reported. Each lobe contains a massive jet of gas that moves at speeds faster than one million kilometers per hour.
German astronomer Rudolph Minkowski discovered the stunning object, which also goes by PN M2-9, in 1947. The planetary nebula's glowing gas represents the end stages of a star of low to intermediate mass that has ejected its outer layers, leaving its remnant core exposed to illuminate the gas.
The researchers noted that the Twin Jet Nebula is considered to be a "bipolar" nebula. Typically, planetary nebulae have one star at their center, but the Twin Jet Nebula has two. The stars seen in this pair have both been determined to be about the mass of the Sun; the larger is nearing the end of its life while the smaller is a spry white dwarf.
The butterfly-like shape of the nebula's "wings" are believe to be caused by the motion of the two stars as they orbit around each other. By measuring the nebula's wings, the researchers estimated it is about 1,200 years old. The two stars at the center of the nebula circle are believed to circle each other once every century, creating the butterfly wings as they go. This motion also allows the white dwarf to strip gas from its companion star, forming a disc of material that extends as far out as 15 times the orbit of Pluto.
