Hubble's Planetary Nebula Gallery. A View of NGC 7009
NGC 7009 has a bright central star at the centre of a dark cavity bounded by a football-shaped rim of dense, blue and red gas. The cavity and its rim are trapped inside smoothly-distributed greenish material in the shape of a barrel and comprised of the star's former outer layers. At larger distances, and lying along the long axis of the nebula, a pair of red 'ansae', or 'handles' appears. Each ansa is joined to the tips of the cavity by a long greenish jet of material. The handles are clouds of low-density gas. NGC 7009 is 1, 400 light-years away in the constellation Aquarius. The Hubble telescope observation was taken April 28, 1996 by the Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2.
Credit:
About the Image
NASA press release
NASA caption
NASA caption
| Id: | opo9738g |
| Type: | Observation |
| Release date: | 17 December 1997, 06:00 |
| Size: | 512 x 512 px |
About the Object
| Name: | IRAS 21014-1133, NGC 7009, Saturn Nebula |
| Type: | • Milky Way : Nebula : Type : Planetary |
| Distance: | 2300 light years |
Colours & filters
| Band | Telescope |
| Hubble Space Telescope WFPC2 |
