Soap Bubble in Space


You would be forgiven if you thought this picture was a soap bubble in front of an astronomical picture. This is a picture of a planetary nebula that was overlooked until this month. Astronomers say it is either spherical or column-shaped, in which case the camera is looking down the barrel of the column. Records indicate that the nebula, officially named PN G75.5+1.7 and nicknamed the "Cygnus Bubble", was recorded sixteen years ago during the second Palomar Sky Survey, but was overlooked at the time because it was so faint. Link -Thanks, healthylivinggal83!

(image credit: Travis A. Rector/U of Alaska Anchorage/Heidi Schweiker/NOAO)

I don't think it's a column.. you can see the gas is denser along the edges and then it gets thinner and thinner towards the center until quickly it 'disappears'. If it were a straight-on column you'd just have a single color circle.

Regardless, it's impressive, and I'm surprised we've never seen something like this before, and that I never noticed we'd never seen something like this before

Also, chocolate is delicious
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Well, in this case it would have to be a hollowish tube, except even that doesn't fit the actual image, but, if it were a solid column, it would be a flat-colored circle
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