One of the wonders of the universe is the picture for these Christmas holidays by Hubble Space Telescope : here is the Spiral Planetary Nebula, NGC 5189 (Gum 47, ID 4272).
We know a little bit things about it : discovered in 1826, the symmetrical nebula NGC 5189 is located in the southern small constellation of Musca. At the beginning seen as bright emission, Henize has seen and verified that NGC 5189 is a quasi-planetary nebula. His structure in the picture looks like a giant and bright blue-oranged ribbon.
A few years ago, NASA has estimated it to be 1 780 light-years away from Earth. It has a neighbor, the Hourglass nebula (MyCn18) located at 8,000 years away for Earth and which looks like a hourglass (see MyCn18's picture by HST).
And now, the question is : for Christmas, will we find a nebula which looks like a Christmas ball, a tree, a snowman ? No idea, but space still reserves us many surprises ...
Many surprises indeed!
The intricate structure of the stellar eruption looks like a giant and brightly coloured ribbon in space.