Hubble Celebrates its 29th Birthday with Unrivaled View of the Southern Crab Nebula

This incredible image of the hourglass-shaped Southern Crab Nebula was taken to mark the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope’s 29th anniversary in space. The nebula, created by a binary star system, is one of the many objects that Hubble has demystified throughout its productive life. This new image adds to our understanding of the nebula and demonstrates the telescope’s continued capabilities.

On 24 April 1990, the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope was launched on the space shuttle Discovery. It has since revolutionised how astronomers and the general public see the Universe. The images it provides are spectacular from both a scientific and a purely aesthetic point of view.

Each year the telescope dedicates a small portion of its precious observing time to take a special anniversary image, focused on capturing particularly beautiful and meaningful objects. This year’s image is the Southern Crab Nebula, and it is no exception [1].

This peculiar nebula, which exhibits nested hourglass-shaped structures, has been created by the interaction between a pair of stars at its centre. The unequal pair consists of a red giant and a white dwarf. The red giant is shedding its outer layers in the last phase of its life before it too lives out its final years as a white dwarf. Some of the red giant’s ejected material is attracted by the gravity of its companion.

When enough of this cast-off material is pulled onto the white dwarf, it too ejects the material outwards in an eruption, creating the structures we see in the nebula. Eventually, the red giant will finish throwing off its outer layers, and stop feeding its white dwarf companion. Prior to this, there may also be more eruptions, creating even more intricate structures.

Astronomers did not always know this, however. The object was first written about in 1967, but was assumed to be an ordinary star until 1989, when it was observed using telescopes at the European Southern Observatory’s La Silla Observatory. The resulting image showed a roughly crab-shaped extended nebula, formed by symmetrical bubbles of gas and dust.

These observations only showed the outer hourglass emanating from a bright central region that could not be resolved. It was not until Hubble observed the Southern Crab in 1999 that the entire structure came into view. This image revealed the inner nested structures, suggesting that the phenomenon that created the outer bubbles had occurred twice in the (astronomically) recent past.

It is fitting that Hubble has returned to this object twenty years after its first observation. This new image adds to the story of an active and evolving object and contributes to the story of Hubble’s role in our evolving understanding of the Universe.
Notes

[1] The Southern Crab Nebula is so named to distinguish it from the better-known Crab Nebula, a supernova remnant visible in the constellation of Taurus.

The Crab of the Southern Sky



The Southern Crab Nebula — Hubble’s 29th anniversary image.

Credit:

NASA, ESA, and STScI

Southern Crab Nebula

A tempestuous relationship between an unlikely pair of stars may have created an oddly shaped, gaseous nebula that resembles an hourglass nestled within an hourglass.

The possible creators of these shapes cannot be seen at all in this Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2image. It's a pair of aging stars buried in the glow of the tiny, central nebula.

Credit:

Romano Corradi, Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias, Tenerife, Spain; Mario Livio, Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Md.; Ulisse Munari, Osservatorio Astronomico di Padova-Asiago, Italy; HugoSchwarz, Nordic Optical Telescope, Canarias, Spain; and NASA/ESA

Formation of the Southern Crab Nebula (artist's impression)


This artist's impression of the formation of Southern Crab nebula illustrates its hourglass-shared structure, that has been created by the interaction between a pair of stars at its centre: a red giant and a white dwarf. The red giant is shedding its outer laters in the last phase of its life before it too lives out its final years as a white dwarf.

Credit:

ESA/Hubble, M. Kornmesser



VIDEOS .

Hubblecast 119: Hubble’s 29th anniversary


On 18 April 2019 Hubble is celebrating its 29th year in space. For this anniversary NASA and ESA dedicated a small amount of its precious observation time to take a look at the beautiful Southern Crab Nebula. This beautiful nebula is created by the ejected material of a red giant, which is in close interaction with a white dwarf star.

Credit:

 

Directed by: Bethany Downer
Visual design and editing: Martin Kornmesser
Written by: Sarah Leach
Narration: Sara Mendes da Costa
Images: NASA, ESA, STScI, Romano Corradi, Mario Livo, Ulisse Munari, Hugo Schwartz
Videos: NASA, ESA, STScI, ESO/L. Calçada, M. Kornmesser
Music: Johan B. Monell (www.johanmonell.com)
Web and technical support: Bethany Downer and Raquel Yumi Shida
Executive producer: Lars Lindberg Christensen

Zooming in on the Southern Crab Nebula


This video takes the viewer on a journey into the 29th anniversary image NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, the Southern Crab Nebula. This peculiar nebula, which exhibits nested hourglass-shaped structures, has been created by the interaction between a pair of stars at its centre. The unequal pair consists of a red giant and a white dwarf. The red giant is shedding its outer layers in the last phase of its life before it too lives out its final years as a white dwarf.

Credit:

Hubble, DSS, Nick Risinger (skysurvey.org)

Music: Astral Electronic 

Formation of the Southern Crab Nebula



This animation takes the viewer on a journey to explore how the Southern Crab Nebula came to form its iconic shape.

Credit:
NASA, ESA, STScI, ESO/M. Kornmesser

Fuente: ESA/Hubble Information Centre

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