Cat's Eye Nebula Age
The Cat Eye Nebula NGC 6543 is a mythical object from the deep sky of the Northern Hemisphere.
Cat's eye nebula age. Huggins observations were the first indication that planetary nebulae consist of extremely rarefiedgases. His early work was devoted to the study of planetary nebulae. The Cats Eye Nebula was discovered by Herschel in the late 18th century.
The Cats Eye Nebula. The central nebula very bright was formed 1000 years ago. A planetary nebula is the glowing gas ejected during the final stages of evolution of a star similar in mass to our Sun.
Known as NGC 6543 it is located 3300 light years from Earth in the constellation Draco. The full beauty of the Cats Eye Nebula NGC 6543 is revealed in this new detailed view from NASAs Hubble Space Telescope. It is a Planetary Nebula expanding gas shell ejected from an end-of-life star in the constellation of the Dragon whose age is estimated at only 1000 years and the distance at only 5200 light years.
This image reveals new details of the Cats Eye Nebula catalogued as NGC 6543 one of the most complex planetary nebulae ever seen. Structurally it is one of the most complex of the known nebulae. The Cats Eye Nebula NGC 6543 is a planetary nebula in the constellation Dragon.
A classic planetary nebula the Cats Eye NGC 6543 represents a final brief yet glorious phase in the life of a sun-like star. Though the Cats Eye Nebula was one of the first planetary nebulae to be discovered it is one of the most complex such nebulae seen in space. The alluring Cats Eye nebula however lies three thousand light-years from Earth across interstellar space.
The other nebulosity much fainter was apparently ejected from the star previously every 1500 years or so. A planetary nebula forms when Sun-like stars gently eject their outer gaseous layers that form bright nebulae with amazing and confounding shapes. It has been expanding ever since as can be seen by comparing Hubble images taken in 1994 1997 2000 and 2002.