August 2, 2000
The cosmos has been expanding since the beginning of time, making room for galaxies, for stars, for planets — and ultimately, for you.
At the Edge of the Crescent Nebula
Birthday · August 2, 2000
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APOD published August 2, 2000. Full image credits are on the original APOD entry below. A publication-date match, not a photo taken on your date. Independent of NASA.
The Crescent Nebula is a rapidly expanding shell of gas surrounding a dying star. In this recently released image by the Hubble Space Telescope, a bright dynamic part of the nebula three light-years across is shown in representative color. The Crescent Nebula began to form about 250,000 years ago as central Wolf-Rayet star WR 136 began to shed its outer envelope in a strong stellar wind, expelling the equivalent of our Sun's mass every 10,000 years. This wind has been impacting surrounding interstellar gas, compacting it into a series of complex shells, and lighting it up. The Crescent Nebula, also known as NGC 6888, lies about 4,700 light-years away in the constellation of Cygnus and can only be seen through a telescope. Star WR 136 will probably undergo a supernova explosion sometime in the next million years.