NGC 2371 Planetary Nebula

Image Description and Details : I first attempted this tiny planetary nebula back in 2019.

I decided to attempt it again by piling on more data, adding in RGB for star color and even tried drizzling the data at 3x instead of 2x. I am much happier with the results. It still took a lot of massaging of the data to get it where I wanted it to be, however.

NGC 2371 is a planetary nebula, the glowing remains of a Sun-like star. The remnant star visible at the centre of NGC 2371 is the super-hot core of the former red giant, now stripped of its outer layers. Its surface temperature is a scorching 240,000 degrees Fahrenheit. NGC 2371 lies about 4,300 light-years away in the constellation Gemini. It is one of the largest planetary nebulas known, measuring roughly three light-years across.

It confused astronomers when it was first studied. Rather than being classified as a single object, it was instead recorded as two objects, named NGC 2371 and NGC 2372, owing to its symmetrical lobed structure.

It is filled with dense knots of gas, fast-moving jets that appear to be changing direction over time, and expanding clouds of material streaming outwards on diametrically opposite sides of the remnant star.

Copyright: Douglas J Struble