NGC 2440 PN in Puppis

The planetary nebula NGC 2440 has bipolar shells with complex inner structure. The nebula is composed of material cast off by a dying sun-like star as it enters its white dwarf phase of evolution. Dense ridges of material are eroded from the nebula's extremely hot central star showing a surface temperature of about 200,000 kelvins.

The distance to this nebula is about 4,000 light-years from Earth, the nebula spans over a light-year and is energized by ultraviolet light from the central star, apparant size is 78 arc-sec.

Find a high resolution image from the Hubble telescope here.

Image data:
Ha-OIII-SII-RGB (Ha 6x20m, OIII 7x20m, SII 7x20m, R 4x20m, G 4x20m, B 4x20m) combined with RGB 10x150s each, seeing 0.7-1 arc-sec, north is up

80cm f/7 Astrooptik Keller corrected cassegrain, FLI Proline 16803, Baader Filters, Prompt 7 CTIO Chile
Processing: Johannes Schedler

Standard color palette below in 50/200% size

click for 200% size

Hubble NB color palette below in 50/200% size

click for 200% size

Last modified on Wednesday, 12 March 2014 10:40

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