Wide-field View of The Bubble Nebula: NGC 7635 in Cassiopeia | Mayall Telescope
The Bubble Nebula (NGC 7635) is one of three shells of gas surrounding the massive star BD+602522, the bright star near the center of the bubble. Energetic radiation from the star ionizes the shell, causing it to glow. About six light-years in diameter, the Bubble Nebula is located in the direction of the constellation Cassiopeia.
The magenta wisps near the bottom-right of the image are an unexpected bonus—the wisps are the remnants of a supernova that exploded thousands of years ago. This was the first optical image of the supernova remnant. It was discovered at radio wavelengths by the Canadian Galactic Plane Survey in 2005.
The Bubble Nebula lies a mere 11,000 light-years away. This mysterious ball of gas is about half a degree from Messier 52, an open star cluster.
What created this huge space bubble? Although it looks delicate, the 10 light-year diameter bubble offers evidence of violent processes at work. A bright hot star is embedded in the nebula's reflecting dust. A fierce stellar wind and intense radiation from the star (that likely has a mass 10 to 20 times that of the Sun) has blasted out the structure of glowing gas against denser material in a surrounding molecular cloud.
The Nicholas U. Mayall Telescope is a four-meter (158 inches) reflector telescope in Arizona named after the American observational astronomer of the same name. The telescope saw first light on February 27, 1973, and was the second-largest in the world at that time.
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Credit: KPNO/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/Brad Ehrhorn/Adam Block
Release Date: June 12, 2014
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