R Sculptoris and its hidden companion

Esahubble_potw1501a_1024

esahubble_potw1501a January 5th, 2015

Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA

This new NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image shows a star known as R Sculptoris, a red giant located 1500 light-years from Earth in the constellation of Sculptor. Recent observations have shown that the material surrounding R Sculptoris actually forms a spiral structure a phenomenon probably caused by a hidden companion star orbiting the star. Systems with multiple stars often lead to unusual or unexpected morphologies, as seen, for example, in the wide range of striking planetary nebulae that Hubble has imaged. R Sculptoris is an example of an asymptotic giant branch (AGB) star. All stars with initial masses up to about eight times that of the Sun will eventually become red giants in the later stages of their lives. They start to cool down and lose a large amount of their mass in a steady, dense wind that streams outwards from the star. With this constant loss of material, red giants like R Sculptoris provide a good portion of the raw materials dust and gas used for the formation of new generations of stars and planets. They also show what is likely to happen to the Sun in a few billion years from now, and help astronomers to understand how the elements we are made up of are distributed throughout the Universe. R Sculptoris itself is located outside the plane of the Milky Way and is easily visible using a moderately sized amateur telescope. In this part of the sky far from the galactic plane, there are relatively few stars but many faint and distant galaxies can be seen. The black region at the centre of the image has been artificially masked.

Provider: Hubble Space Telescope | ESA

Image Source: https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/potw1501a/

Curator: ESA/Hubble, Garching bei München, Germany

Image Use Policy: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License

Image Details

Image Type
Observation
Object Name
R Sculptoris
Subject - Milky Way
Star > Evolutionary Stage > Red Giant
Star > Type > Variable
Star > Circumstellar Material
Esahubble_potw1501a_128
 

Position Details

Position (ICRS)
RA = 1h 26m 58.0s
DEC = -32° 32’ 31.0”
Orientation
North is 0.4° CCW
Field of View
0.0 x 0.0 arcminutes
Constellation
Sculptor

Color Mapping

  Telescope Spectral Band Wavelength
Blue Hubble (ACS) Optical (B) 475.0 nm
Green Hubble (ACS) Optical (V) 606.0 nm
Red Hubble (ACS) Infrared (I) 814.0 nm
Spectrum_base
Blue
Green
Red
Esahubble_potw1501a_1280
×
ID
potw1501a
Subject Category
B.3.1.4   B.3.2.1   B.3.7  
Subject Name
R Sculptoris
Credits
ESA/Hubble & NASA
Release Date
2015-01-05T10:00:00
Lightyears
Redshift
Reference Url
https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/potw1501a/
Type
Observation
Image Quality
Distance Notes
Facility
Hubble Space Telescope, Hubble Space Telescope, Hubble Space Telescope
Instrument
ACS, ACS, ACS
Color Assignment
Blue, Green, Red
Band
Optical, Optical, Infrared
Bandpass
B, V, I
Central Wavelength
475, 606, 814
Start Time
Integration Time
Dataset ID
Notes
Coordinate Frame
ICRS
Equinox
J2000
Reference Value
21.7416856764, -32.5419467603
Reference Dimension
1012.0, 1161.0
Reference Pixel
506.0, 580.0
Scale
-6.95768174132e-07, 6.95768174132e-07
Rotation
0.3999999999999867
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
potw1501a
Metadata Date
2014-09-12T10:10:14+02:00
Metadata Version
1.1
×

 

Detailed color mapping information coming soon...

×

There is no distance meta data in this image.

 

Providers | Sign In