February 3, 2026
You were not dropped into the cosmos as a stranger. You came from it entirely: borrowed from stars, carried by Earth, warmed by the Sun, and...
Red Spider Planetary Nebula from Webb
Birthday · February 3, 2026
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APOD published February 3, 2026. Full image credits are on the original APOD entry below. A publication-date match, not a photo taken on your date. Independent of NASA.
Oh what a tangled web a planetary nebula can weave. The Red Spider Planetary Nebula shows the complex structure that can result when a normal star ejects its outer gases and becomes a white dwarf star. Officially tagged NGC 6537, this two-lobed symmetric planetary nebula houses one of the hottest white dwarfs ever observed, probably as part of a binary star system. Internal winds flowing out from the central stars, have been measured in excess of 1,000 kilometers per second. These winds expand the nebula, flow along the nebula's walls, and cause waves of hot gas and dust to collide. Atoms caught in these colliding shocks radiate light shown in the featured false-color infrared picture by the James Webb Space Telescope. The Red Spider Nebula lies toward the constellation of the Archer (Sagittarius). Its distance is not well known but has been estimated by some to be about 4,000 light-years.