Hourglass Nebula

The Hourglass Nebula, officially designated MyCn 18, features a stunningly symmetric hourglass shape due to the way the dying central star is ejecting its outer layers. Thick rings of dense dust and gas constrict the outflow of material, forcing the stellar winds to expand into two perpendicular bubbles. This creates the signature pinched waist and twin bulbs.

The iconic, famous color image of the Hourglass Nebula was captured by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and revealed to the public in 1996. The Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2) was used to capture the incredible detail of the central eye-like structure. This image dramatically highlighted the intricate concentric rings surrounding the dying star.

The Hourglass Nebula is located roughly 8,000 light-years away from Earth in the southern constellation of Musca. Because it lies deep in the southern sky, it cannot be seen by northern hemisphere observers without powerful southern observatories. It was initially cataloged by astronomers Margaret Mayall and Annie Jump Cannon.

The central star of the Hourglass Nebula is a dying, Sun-like star that is rapidly shedding its outer atmosphere to become a white dwarf. What makes it unique is the striking, unblinking 'eye' appearance captured in the Hubble images, caused by bright gases illuminated directly in our line of sight. It serves as a preview of what will eventually happen to our own solar system in roughly 5 billion years.