NASA Video
Published on Feb 24, 2017
This time-lapse video sequence of Hubble Space Telescope images reveals dramatic changes in a ring of material around the exploded star Supernova 1987A.
The images, taken from 1994 to 2016, show the effects of a shock wave from the supernova blast smashing into the ring. The ring begins to brighten as the shock wave hits it. The ring is about one light-year across.
Discovered in 1987, Supernova 1987A is the closest observed supernova to Earth since 1604. The exploded star resides 163,000 light-years away in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of our Milky Way.
Credit: NASA, ESA, and R. Kirshner (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation), and P. Challis (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics)
YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g12g2Nq3_2I
Read more: The Dawn of a New Era for Supernova 1987a
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2017/the-dawn-of-a-new-era-for-supernova-1987a
“The ring is one light year in diameter.”
For comparison, the orbit of Pluto is 0.001 light years in diameter. So that ring is 1,000 times bigger than the Solar System.