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| Boomerang Nebula |
| The Boomerang Nebula (also called the Bow Tie Nebula) is a protoplanetary nebula located 5,000 light-years away from Earth in the constellation Centaurus. The nebula is measured at 1 K (-272.15 °C; -457.87 °F), the naturally coldest place currently known in the Universe. The Boomerang Nebula was formed from the outflow of gas from a star at its core. The gas is moving outwards at a speed of about 164 km/s and expanding rapidly as it moves out into space. This expansion is the cause of the nebula's very low temperature. The Boomerang Nebula was photographed in detail by the Hubble Space Telescope in 1998. It is believed that the nebula is a star or stellar system evolving toward the planetary nebula phase. Keith Taylor and Mike Scarrott called it the Boomerang Nebula in 1980 after observing it with the Anglo-Australian telescope at the Siding Spring Observatory. Unable to view it with the same detail as with the Hubble, the astronomers saw merely a slight asymmetry in the nebula's lobes, suggesting a curved shape like a boomerang. The high-resolution Hubble images indicate that the Bow Tie Nebula would perhaps have been a better name. |