The Butterfly Nebula

The Butterfly Nebula is located between 2,500 and 3,800 light-years away in the constellation Scorpius. The nebula was formed when a dying star shed its outer layers of gas, which billow out like butterfly wings. At the heart of the nebula is a super-hot white dwarf star, one of the hottest known, whose intense ultraviolet radiation causes the discarded gas to glow in a range of colors. The distinctive “butterfly” shape is a result of a dense, doughnut-shaped ring of dust and gas around the star’s equator, which restricts the outflow of material and forces the gas to shoot out in opposite directions. (Featured Image from New Thinking Allowed)

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