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Il cielo sopra di noi: Viaggio attraverso il cielo stellato ad occhio nudo e con il telescopio

Il mio primo libro, una guida completa sull’osservazione del cielo ad occhio nudo e con il telescopio. Imparerete le nozioni base di astronomia, come orientarvi nel cielo stellato, a riconoscere le costellazioni, a usare il telescopio e molto altro ancora.

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SH2-308: The Dolphin-Head Nebula

21/10/2021

Blown by fast winds from a hot, massive star, this cosmic bubble is huge. Cataloged as Sharpless 2-308 it lies some 5,000 light-years away toward the constellation of the Big Dog (Canis Major) and covers slightly more of the sky than a Full Moon. That corresponds to a diameter of 60 light-years at its estimated distance. The massive star that created the bubble, a Wolf-Rayet star, is the bright one near the center of the nebula. Wolf-Rayet stars have over 20 times the mass of the Sun and are thought to be in a brief, pre-supernova phase of massive star evolution. Fast winds from this Wolf-Rayet star create the bubble-shaped nebula as they sweep up slower moving material from an earlier phase of evolution. The windblown nebula has an age of about 70,000 years. Relatively faint emission captured by narrowband filters in the deep image is dominated by the glow of ionized oxygen atoms mapped to a blue hue. Presenting a mostly harmless outline, SH2-308 is also known as The Dolphin-head Nebula.