Explanation:
Adrift in the
rich star fields
of the constellation Cygnus, this
lovely, symmetric bubble nebula was only recently recognized and may
not yet appear in astronomical catalogs.
In fact, amateur astronomer
Dave Jurasevich identified
it as a nebula on July 6 in
his
images of the complex
Cygnus region that included the Crescent Nebula (NGC 6888).
He subsequently notified the International Astronomical Union.
Only eleven days later the same object was independently identified by
Mel Helm at Sierra Remote
Observatories,
imaged by Keith Quattrocchi and Helm, and also submitted to the IAU
as a potentially unknown nebula.
Their final composite image is seen here,
including narrow-band image data that highlights the
nebula's delicate outlines.
What is the newly recognized bubble nebula?
Like the Crescent Nebula
itself, this cosmic bubble could be blown by
winds from a massive
Wolf-Rayet star, or it could be a
spherically-shaped planetary nebula,
a final phase in the life of a sun-like star.
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