While many other images of the famous Crab Nebula nebula have focused on the filaments in the outer part of the nebula, this image shows the very heart of the Crab Nebula including the central neutron star — it is the rightmost of the two bright stars near the centre of this image. The rapid motion of the material nearest to the central star is revealed by the subtle rainbow of colours in this time-lapse image, the rainbow effect being due to the movement of material over the time between one image and another.

M1: The heart of the Crab Nebula

Peering deep into M1, this spectacular Hubble image captures the nebula’s beating heart: the rapidly spinning pulsar at its core. Bright wisps are moving outward from the pulsar (the rightmost of the two bright stars near the center of the image) at half the speed of light to form an expanding ring. These wisps form along magnetic field lines in a gas of extremely energetic particles driven into space by the highly magnetized, rapidly rotating neutron star. For more information about Hubble’s observations of M1, see: hubblesite.org/contents/news-releases/2016/news-2016-26.html

Credits: NASA and ESA Acknowledgment: J. Hester (ASU) and M. Weisskopf (NASA/MSFC)
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TakenJuly 7, 2116
Image CreditNASA and ESA Acknowledgment: J. Hester (ASU) and M. Weisskopf (NASA/MSFC)
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