The first image of a new gaseous component in a planetary nebula

29/06/2016
After shining for millions of years, stars end their lives in two main ways: very massive stars die very violently as supernovae, while lower mass stars die as planetary nebulae. In both cases, they inject into the interstellar medium the chemical elements synthesized in the stellar interior. Therefore, knowing the composition of this gas gives us fundamental information to understand the chemical evolution of our galaxy and, by extension, of the Universe. The images obtained by a team led by the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) and taken thanks to the blue tunable filter of the OSIRIS instrument at the Gran Telescopio CANARIAS (GTC), from the Roque de los Muchachos Observatory (Garafía, La Palma). The article is led by Jorge García Rojas, advanced postdoctoral researcher Severo Ochoa. >> Read more