Astronomy Picture of the Day 9-20-02

NASA ^ | 9-20-02 | Robert Nemiroff and Jerry Bonnell

[petuniasevan]

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

2002 September 20

The Crab Nebula Pulsar Shrugs
Credit: J. Hester (ASU), CXC, HST, NOAO, NSF, NASA

Explanation: How does a city-sized neutron star power the vast Crab Nebula? The expulsion of wisps of hot gas at high speeds appears to be at least part of the answer. Yesterday time-lapse movies taken from both the Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Hubble Space Telescope were released showing a wisp of gas moving out at about half the speed of light. Wisps like this likely result from tremendous electric voltages created by the central pulsar, a rapidly rotating, magnetized, central neutron star. The hot plasma strikes existing gas, causing it glow in colors across the electromagnetic spectrum. Pictured above is a composite image of the center of the Crab Nebula where red represents radio emission, green represents visible emission, and blue represents X-ray emission. The dot at the very center is the hot pulsar spinning 30 times per second.

[petuniasevan]

The Crab Nebula is located in the constellation Taurus and is about 6000 light-years distant.

I highly recommend clicking on the link above for the time-lapse movies!

Fast Facts for Crab Nebula Movie:
Credit	NASA/CXC/ASU/J.Hester et al.
Scale	Close up image is 0.8 arcmin, other 7 images are 1.6 arcmin.
Category	Supernova Remnant
Coordinates (J2000)	RA 05h 34m 32s | Dec +22º 0.0' 52"
Constellation	Taurus
Observation Date	November 25 & December 18, 2000, January 9 & 30, 2001, February 21, March 15 & April 6, 2001
Observation Time	45.9 hours total
Obs. ID	1995-2001
Color Code	Intensity
Instrument	ACIS-S
Distance	6000 light years from Earth

[petuniasevan]

[farmfriend]

Now if I just had some fabric that looked like that....

[sleavelessinseattle]

I want to paint my TRUCK like that!!! WOW! Characteristically GREAT APOD, P7...Hope you are back to 100% after the weekend!

[mtngrl@vrwc]

Yowzers! What a picture!

[Vets_Husband_and_Wife]

End my Day with beauty,...awake my yearnings for this existence. Cruel. cruel, friend.

[MeekOneGOP]

[Graewoulf]

Thanks for a great picture to start the morning with!

[BossyRoofer]

This is some of your better work, great picture!
keep it up. APOD Rules!

[Freedom2specul8]

That's awesome. I've been making some of these wallpapers for the puter. We love it.. :) Did you guys see this? Mystery Object Orbits Earth

[Aggie Mama]

I don't see a crab. I do, however, see something similar to that painting, The Scream.