CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — A telescope in Chile has captured a stunning new picture of a grand and graceful cosmic butterfly.
The National Science Foundation’s NoirLab released the picture Wednesday.
Snapped last month by the Gemini South telescope, the aptly named Butterfly Nebula is 2,500 to 3,800 light-years away in the constellation Scorpius. A single light-year is 6 trillion miles.
At the heart of this bipolar nebula is a white dwarf star that cast aside its outer layers of gas long ago. The discarded gas forms the butterflylike wings billowing from the aging star, whose heat causes the gas to glow.
Schoolchildren in Chile chose this astronomical target to celebrate 25 years of operation by the International Gemini Observatory.
___
The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
LATEST POSTS
- 1
Step by step instructions to Utilize Open Record Rewards for Your Potential benefit - 2When a sperm whale gives birth, the mother gets help from her friends
- 3Get To Be familiar with The Historical backdrop Of Western Medication
- 4Figure out How to Take part in Open Conversations Around 5G Pinnacles
- 5The many ways that baking is winter therapy. With a delicious ending
- Aluminum salts emerge as likely target as health officials scrutinize childhood vaccines
- Was This Driver Simply Having Some good times Or Behaving Like An Ass?
- Do you lean your seat back on the plane? These travel pros — and real-life couple — won't do it.
- Earth’s magnetic field protects life on Earth from radiation, but it can move, and the magnetic poles can even flip
- Some super-smart dogs can pick up new words just by eavesdropping
- US FDA panel to weigh bid to market nicotine pouches as lower-risk than cigarettes
- Herzog, German Chancellor Merz discuss final Gaza hostage, Arrow 3 exchange in Jerusalem
- A Lone Wolf Outsmarted Hunters in the Black Forest and Then Vanished
- Nations for Youngsters to Visit
