Image Credit: Hubble Legacy Archive, ESA, NASA; Processing – Donald WaidExplanation: It’s the dim star, not the bright one, near the center of
NGC 3132 that created this odd but beautiful
planetary nebula. Nicknamed the
Eight-Burst Nebula and the Southern
Ring Nebula, the glowing gas originated in the
outer layers of a star like our
Sun. In this
reprocessed color picture, the hot purplish pool of light seen surrounding this
binary system is energized by the hot surface of the faint star. Although
photographed to explore unusual symmetries, it’s the asymmetries that help make this
planetary nebula so intriguing. Neither the unusual shape of the surrounding cooler shell nor the structure and placements of the cool filamentary
dust lanes running across
NGC 3132 are well understood.