Earlier this February, NASA’s Hubble Telescope captured the death of a low-mass star, similar to the sun (Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, Acknowledgement: Judy Schmidt). It was an exciting moment for NASA to see the explosive death of the Calabash Nebula and capture the exact moment when it began shedding its outer layers of gas and other materials. The Calabash Nebula is also referred to as the Rotten Egg Nebula because of its high sulphur composition that presumably makes it smell just like a rotten egg. In the photo, the gases come out as a bright yellow-orange color.
Obtaining such as spectacular photo is rare because of how quickly a star’s death can be, especially since it exploded at a rate of 620,000 miles per hour. NASA’s photo gives us a vivid snapshot of what the sun’s eventual death might look like. But lucky for us, this won’t be for another 5 billion years or so.