SHAPLEY 1

PLANETARY NEBULA IN NORMA  

 (Image Centred at ra 15h:51.41m / dec -51:31)

May 2014 - Camping La Porteña, San Antonio de Areco, Buenos Aires, Argentina

DATA

Type: Planetary Nebula

Apparent magnitude: n/a. Central White Dwarf S 14

Apparent diameter: 1.1 arc minutes

Distance: 1.000 light years

IMAGE INFORMATION

SCOPE: 8" Orion Optics UK with Televue Paracorr

CAMERA: QSI 583 WS

FILTERS: Baader LRGB

SKY CONDITIONS: rural skies, foggy night

EXPOSURES: LRGB (30,30,30,30)

OBJECT DESCRIPTION AND IMAGE SESSION

This is an unusual annular planetary nebula in Norma. The nebula itself appears quite small at a little over an arc minute in diameter, while its central star is a magnitude 14 white dwarf. This object is unusual because those planetaries that are not bipolar are more or less spherical shells of material thrown off by the central star as it undergoes an internal rearrangement. We often see them as thick annuli because we look through a greater thickness at the edge of the shell. However, Shapley 1 seems to be a true torus, a doughnut-shaped ring of material that we happen to see face-on around the central star. Sp-1 is about 1000 light years distant. (*)

It was discovered by US astronomer Harlow Shapley in 1936.

(*) Australian Astronomical Observatory