Blue bubble in Carina

Esahubble_potw1608a_1024

esahubble_potw1608a February 22nd, 2016

Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA Acknowledgement: Judy Schmidt

Sparkling at the centre of this beautiful NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image is a WolfRayet star known as WR 31a, located about 30 000 light-years away in the constellation of Carina (The Keel). The distinctive blue bubble appearing to encircle WR 31a, and its uncatalogued stellar sidekick, is a WolfRayet nebula an interstellar cloud of dust, hydrogen, helium and other gases. Created when speedy stellar winds interact with the outer layers of hydrogen ejected by WolfRayet stars, these nebulae are frequently ring-shaped or spherical. The bubble estimated to have formed around 20 000 years ago is expanding at a rate of around 220 000 kilometres per hour! Unfortunately, the lifecycle of a WolfRayet star is only a few hundred thousand years the blink of an eye in cosmic terms. Despite beginning life with a mass at least 20 times that of the Sun, WolfRayet stars typically lose half their mass in less than 100 000 years. And WR 31a is no exception to this case. It will, therefore, eventually end its life as a spectacular supernova, and the stellar material expelled from its explosion will later nourish a new generation of stars and planets.

Provider: Hubble Space Telescope | ESA

Image Source: https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/potw1608a/

Curator: ESA/Hubble, Garching bei München, Germany

Image Use Policy: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License

Image Details

Image Type
Observation
Object Name
WR 31a
Subject - Milky Way
Star > Type > Wolf-Rayet
Esahubble_potw1608a_128
 

Position Details

Position (ICRS)
RA = 10h 53m 59.7s
DEC = -60° 26’ 43.8”
Orientation
North is 49.2° CCW
Field of View
1.6 x 1.6 arcminutes
Constellation
Carina

Color Mapping

  Telescope Spectral Band Wavelength
Cyan Hubble (ACS) Optical (V) 606.0 nm
Orange Hubble (ACS) Infrared (I) 814.0 nm
Spectrum_base
Cyan
Orange
Esahubble_potw1608a_1280
×
ID
potw1608a
Subject Category
B.3.2.4  
Subject Name
WR 31a
Credits
ESA/Hubble & NASA Acknowledgement: Judy Schmidt
Release Date
2016-02-22T06:00:00
Lightyears
Redshift
Reference Url
https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/potw1608a/
Type
Observation
Image Quality
Distance Notes
Measurement converted from kpc http://adsabs.harvard.edu/full/1993ApJ...411..336D
Facility
Hubble Space Telescope, Hubble Space Telescope
Instrument
ACS, ACS
Color Assignment
Cyan, Orange
Band
Optical, Infrared
Bandpass
V, I
Central Wavelength
606, 814
Start Time
Integration Time
Dataset ID
Notes
Coordinate Frame
ICRS
Equinox
J2000
Reference Value
163.498843097, -60.4454962516
Reference Dimension
1956.0, 1887.0
Reference Pixel
978.0, 943.0
Scale
-1.38935861766e-05, 1.38935861766e-05
Rotation
49.21999999999997
Coordinate System Projection:
TAN
Quality
Full
FITS Header
Notes
Creator (Curator)
ESA/Hubble
URL
http://www.spacetelescope.org/
Name
Email
Telephone
Address
Karl-Schwarzschild-Strasse 2
City
Garching bei München
State/Province
Postal Code
D-85748
Country
Germany
Rights
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
Publisher
ESA/Hubble
Publisher ID
esahubble
Resource ID
potw1608a
Metadata Date
2015-12-17T18:32:17+01:00
Metadata Version
1.1
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Detailed color mapping information coming soon...

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There is no distance meta data in this image.

 

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