The
Bubble Nebula
From NASA’s AstronomyPicture of the Day
Blown
by the wind from a massive star, this interstellar apparition has a
surprisingly familiar shape.
Cataloged as NGC 7635, it is also known simply as The Bubble Nebula.
Although
it looks delicate, the 10 light-year diameter bubble offers evidence of violent processes at
work. Below and left of the Bubble's center is a hot, O star, several hundred
thousand times more luminous and around 45 times more massive than the Sun.
A
fierce stellar wind and intense radiation from that star has blasted out the structure
of glowing gas against
denser material in a surrounding molecular cloud.
The intriguing Bubble Nebula and associated cloud complex lie a mere 11,000
light-years away toward the boastful constellation Cassiopeia.
This
tantalizing view of the cosmic bubble is composed from narrowband image data,
recording emission from the region's ionized hydrogen and oxygen atoms. To
create the three color image,
hydrogen and oxygen emission were used for red and blue and combined to create
the green channel.
Image Credit & Copyright: Bernard Michaud
