The European Space Agency (ESA) is Europe’s gateway to space. Its mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world.
Find out more about space activities in our 23 Member States, and understand how ESA works together with their national agencies, institutions and organisations.
Exploring our Solar System and unlocking the secrets of the Universe
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Go to topicUsing space to benefit citizens and meet future challenges on Earth
Go to topicMaking space accessible and developing the technologies for the future
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This new, detailed, Hubble image shows a planetary nebula in the making – a proto-planetary nebula. A dying star (hidden behind dust and gas in the centre of the nebula) has ejected massive amounts of gas. Parts of the gas have reached tremendous velocities of up to one-and-a-half million kilometres per hour.
Shown in blue is light from hydrogen and ionised nitrogen arising from supersonic shocks where the gas stream rams into the surrounding material. The image shows for the first time these complex gas structures which are predicted by theory.
The Hubble image was taken shortly before Christmas 2000 with the WFPC2 instrument (Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2) in four different filters. Here, light from 791 nm is displayed in red (exposure time 900 s), 675 nm in green (900 s), while combined light from hydrogen (656 nm) and ionised nitrogen atoms (658 nm) are shown as blue (14,700 s).
Photo: ESA & Valentin Bujarrabal (Observatorio Astronomico Nacional, Spain)