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Planetary Nebula NGC 7009

A large, semi-transparent green American football-shaped object that extends from top left to bottom right is set against the black background of space.
Like NGC 6826, NGC 7009 has a bright central star at the center of a dark cavity bounded by a football-shaped rim of dense, blue and red gas. The cavity and its rim are trapped inside smoothly-distributed greenish material in the shape of a barrel and comprised of the star's former outer layers. At larger distances, and lying along the long axis of the nebula, a pair of red "ansae", or "handles" appears. Each ansa is joined to the tips of the cavity by a long greenish jet of material. The handles are clouds of low-density gas. NGC 7009 is 1,400 light-years away in the constellation Aquarius. The Hubble telescope observation was taken April 28, 1996 by the Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2.
  • Object Name
    Object NameA name or catalog number that astronomers use to identify an astronomical object.
    NGC 7009
  • Release Date
    December 17, 1997
  • Science Release
    Hubble Witnesses the Final Blaze of Glory of Sun-Like Stars
    Read the release
  • Credits
    Credits: Bruce Balick (University of Washington), Jason Alexander (University of Washington), Arsen Hajian (U.S. Naval Observatory), Yervant Terzian (Cornell University), Mario Perinotto (University of Florence, Italy), Patrizio Patriarchi (Arcetri Observatory, Italy), NASA

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Last Updated
Mar 14, 2025
Contact
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Claire Andreoli
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
Greenbelt, Maryland
claire.andreoli@nasa.gov

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