Normally faint and elusive, the Jellyfish Nebula is caught in
this alluring telescopic field of view. The entire scene is a two panel mosaic constructed using narrowband image data, with emission from sulfur, hydrogen and oxygen atoms shown in red, green and blue hues. It's anchored right and left by two bright stars,
Mu and
Eta Geminorum, at the foot of the
celestial twin. The Jellyfish Nebula itself is right of center, the brighter arcing ridge of emission with dangling tentacles. In fact, the cosmic jellyfish is part of bubble-shaped supernova remnant IC 443, the expanding debris cloud from a
massive star that exploded. Light from the explosion first reached planet Earth over 30,000 years ago. Like its cousin in
astrophysical waters the Crab Nebula supernova remnant, the Jellyfish Nebula is
known to harbor a neutron star, the remnant of the collapsed stellar core. An emission nebula cataloged as
Sharpless 249 fills the field at the upper left. The Jellyfish Nebula is about 5,000 light-years away. At that distance, this image would be about 300 light-years across.