Little Dumbbell Nebula

The Little Dumbbell Nebula (also known as Messier 76 or NGC 650) is a planetary nebula in the constellation Perseus with an apparent magnitude of 10.10 mag. The lighter area of ​​the core is also referred to as a " cap " measures 1.45 " x 0.7 " arc minutes. The somewhat weaker outer part has almost double the expansion. Because of its shape, the object Butterfly Nebula or less Dumbbell Nebula is called. Quite around the outside there is a halo that consists of gas that material which the star had already been sealed long before the explosion in its phase as a red giant. This is nearly 4.8 arcmin. This value corresponds to the distance of the nebula an absolute extension of about 21 light years.

The central star appears as a double star system. Because of recordings with the Hubble Space Telescope, however, indicated that the southern component actually about 20,000 light-years is behind the fog. Thus, these two stars form a so-called optical double star system dar. your distance is 1.4 arc seconds.

For a long time this object as a double -scale fog, which meant that it also received two NGC numbers. End of the 19th century finally succeeded by spectroscopic analyzes to prove that it is a planetary nebula.

Discovery

The planetary nebula NGC 650 was discovered on September 5, 1780 by the French astronomer Pierre Méchain.