Halloween may be over, but the spooky fun continues with a new image of the ‘Skull Nebula’.
The nebula, also known as NGC 246, bears a strong resemblance to a skull, and was captured in stunning detail by the European Southern Observatory’s (ESO’s) Very Large Telescope.
ESO explained: “The Skull Nebula lies about 1600 light-years away from Earth in the southern constellation of Cetus (The Whale).
“It formed when a Sun-like star expelled its outer layers in its old age, leaving behind its naked core — a white dwarf — one of two stars that can be seen at the very centre of NGC 246.”
The Skull Nebula has been known for centuries, however, it was’t until 2014 that astronomers discovered a third start at the heart of the nebula.
ESO said: “This star, which is not visible in this image, is a dim red dwarf that sits close to the white dwarf at about 500 times the distance between Earth and the Sun.
“The red and white dwarf stars orbit each other as a pair, and the outer star orbits the two dwarfs at a distance of around 1900 times the Earth-Sun separation.
“Collectively, these three stars establish NGC 246 as the first known planetary nebula with a hierarchical triple stellar system at its centre.”
The new image was taken by the FORS 2 instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope in the Atacama Desert.
ESO added: “This new image of the Skull Nebula intentionally captures light emitted in some narrow ranges of wavelengths — those associated with hydrogen and oxygen gas.
“Observations of light emitted by particular elements help reveal a wealth of information about an object’s chemical and structural compositions.
“This new image of the Skull Nebula highlights where NGC 246 is rich or poor in hydrogen (shown in red) and oxygen (depicted in light blue).”
