Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Lyra (Lyr)  ·  Contains:  IC 1296  ·  M 57  ·  NGC 6720  ·  PK063+13.1  ·  Ring Nebula
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The Ring Nebula (M57), Prabhakaran
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The Ring Nebula (M57)

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The Ring Nebula (M57), Prabhakaran
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The Ring Nebula (M57)

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Description

The Ring Nebula (M57)  is a planetary nebula in the northern constellation of Lyra, it is more complicated than it appears through a small telescope. The easily visible central ring is about one light-year across, but this wide field and deep exposure image from various nights reveal the looping filaments of glowing gas extending much farther from the nebula's central star. This composite image includes red light emitted by hydrogen as well as visible and infrared light. The Ring Nebula is an elongated planetary nebula, a type of nebula created when a Sun-like star evolves to throw off its outer atmosphere to become a white dwarf star. The Ring Nebula is about 2,500 light-years away. IC 1296 which is a faint, face-on barred-spiral galaxy is visible to the bottom right from the ring nebula. It's quite rare to see galaxies near planetary nebulae because the planetaries are found along with the disk of our galaxy.

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The Ring Nebula (M57), Prabhakaran