Billions of years from now, as our Sun nears the end of its life and the helium nuclei begin to fuse in its core, it will swell dramatically and transform into what is called a red giant star. After swallowing Mercury, Venus and Earth with barely a burp, it will grow so large that it will no longer be able to hold its outermost layers of gas and dust.
In a glorious ending, it will eject these layers into space to form a magnificent veil of light, which will glow like a neon sign for thousands of years before fading away.
The galaxy is dotted with thousands of these jewel-like memorials, known as planetary nebulae. They are the normal final stage for stars ranging from half the mass of the Sun to eight times its mass. (More massive stars have a much more violent end, an explosion called a supernova.) Planetary nebulae come in an astonishing variety of shapes, as names like southern crab, cat's eye, and butterfly suggest. But as beautiful as they are, they have also been an enigma for astronomers. How does a cosmic butterfly emerge from the seemingly featureless round cocoon of a red giant star?
Observations and computer models now point to an explanation that would have seemed far-fetched 30 years ago: Most red giants have a much smaller companion star lurking in their gravitational embrace. This second star shapes the transformation into a planetary nebula, much like a potter shapes a vessel on a potter's wheel.
Enlarge / NASA's new James Webb Space Telescope has revealed...
Billions of years from now, as our Sun nears the end of its life and the helium nuclei begin to fuse in its core, it will swell dramatically and transform into what is called a red giant star. After swallowing Mercury, Venus and Earth with barely a burp, it will grow so large that it will no longer be able to hold its outermost layers of gas and dust.
In a glorious ending, it will eject these layers into space to form a magnificent veil of light, which will glow like a neon sign for thousands of years before fading away.
The galaxy is dotted with thousands of these jewel-like memorials, known as planetary nebulae. They are the normal final stage for stars ranging from half the mass of the Sun to eight times its mass. (More massive stars have a much more violent end, an explosion called a supernova.) Planetary nebulae come in an astonishing variety of shapes, as names like southern crab, cat's eye, and butterfly suggest. But as beautiful as they are, they have also been an enigma for astronomers. How does a cosmic butterfly emerge from the seemingly featureless round cocoon of a red giant star?
Observations and computer models now point to an explanation that would have seemed far-fetched 30 years ago: Most red giants have a much smaller companion star lurking in their gravitational embrace. This second star shapes the transformation into a planetary nebula, much like a potter shapes a vessel on a potter's wheel.
Enlarge / NASA's new James Webb Space Telescope has revealed...
Enlarge / NASA's new James Webb Space Telescope has revealed...
