The Ring Nebula (M57): Gas cloud from a dying nearby sun-like star

[CLICK ON IMAGE FOR HIGH RESOLUTION], NASA, ESA,  and the Hubble Heritage

The Ring Nebula (M57) is probably [next to Saturn’s rings] the most famous celestial band. …
ringnebThe recent mapping of the expanding nebula’s 3-D structure, based in part on this clear Hubble image, indicates that the nebula is a relatively dense, donut-like ring wrapped around the middle of a football-shaped cloud of glowing gas. The view from planet Earth looks down the long axis of the football, face-on to the ring.
Of course, in this well-studied example of a planetary nebula, the glowing material [is the gas] expelled from the dying, once sun-like star, now a tiny pinprick of light seen at the nebula’s center.
Intense ultraviolet light from the hot central star ionizes atoms in the gas. In the picture, the blue color in the center is ionized helium, the cyan color of the inner ring is the glow of hydrogen and oxygen, and the reddish color of the outer ring is from nitrogen and sulfur.
The Ring Nebula is about one light-year across and 2,000 light-years away.

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