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Astronomers using the Hubble telescope have
obtained the sharpest view yet of a glowing loop of gas called the Ring
Nebula (M57), first cataloged more than 200 years ago by French astronomer
Charles Messier.
The pictures reveal that the "Ring"
is actually a cylinder of gas seen almost end-on. Such elongated shapes
are common among other planetary nebulae, because thick disks of gas
and dust form a waist around a dying star. This "waist" slows
down the expansion of material ejected by the doomed object. The easiest
escape route for this cast-off material is above and below the star.
This photo reveals dark, elongated clumps of material embedded in the
gas at the edge of the nebula; the dying central star is floating in
a blue haze of hot gas.