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NGC2359 Thor's Helmet - Wolf-Rayet Star WR7

NGC2359 Thor's Helmet - Wolf-Rayet Star WR7 also known as Gum 4 or Sharpless 2-298, located at a distance of 11,960 light years away in the Constellation of Canis Major!

This is an emission nebula that is about 30 light years across, the Bubble Blown by the Wolf-Rayet Star WR7, an extremely hot star thought to be in a brief pre-supernova stage of evolution.

 

The nebula has an overall bubble shape, but with complex filamentary structures. The nebula contains several hundred solar masses of ionized material, plus several thousand more of unionized gas. It is largely interstellar material swept up by winds from the central star, although some material does appear to be enriched with the products of fusion and is likely to come directly from the star.

I captured this image at the Okie-Tex Star Party 09-29-2016

Baader modified Canon Rebel Xsi DSLR & 5.5 Newt. Scope, ISO 1600, 1 hour exposure. I included a close-up crop from the original wide field image.

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Uploaded on March 14, 2017