Anomaly nebula 90 EP

Ring Nebula

RA 283.3959° · Dec 33.0286° · openngc

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Score breakdown

· 8 badges

90 pts · Anomaly

Anomaly 120 pts → Mythic

The Ring Nebula +22
Messier object +12
Planetary nebula (a dying star's shell) +12
Its dying star is still visible +12
Coming towards us +10
Nebula +8
Has a proper name +8
Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6

Total score 90

30 more points to reach Mythic.

Badges

Nebula · +8
Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
Messier object · +12
Has a proper name · +8
Planetary nebula (a dying star's shell) · +12
Coming towards us · +10
Its dying star is still visible · +12
The Ring Nebula · +22

Trivia

Hard to believe

Messier object. One of the 110 showpieces of the Messier list — catalogued as M57.

What it actually is

What it actually is. A planetary nebula: the shed outer atmosphere of a dying Sun-like star, lit from within by the naked stellar core left behind.

Sense of scale

In perspective. Far away by human standards, yet still a local address inside the Milky Way's spiral arms.

Find it in the sky

How to spot it. At magnitude 8.8 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Lyra.
Northern sky. It rides the northern half of the sky — an easier target the further north you are.
Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around July — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

Verdict. Impossible with our current technology — and the next millennium of it.

Getting there

Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 45.1 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

central star mag: 15.29
constellation: Lyr
dist ly: 2566.7427
dso type: PN
mag: 8.8
messier: yes
messier number: 057
name: Ring Nebula
named: yes
radial velocity kms: -19
size arcmin: 1.27

Nearby objects

About Ring Nebula

Ring Nebula is an anomaly nebula. It lies about 2,566.7 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Lyr and shines at apparent magnitude 8.8.

A planetary nebula: the shed outer atmosphere of a dying Sun-like star, lit from within by the naked stellar core left behind.

How to see it

Look for Ring Nebula in the constellation Lyr. At apparent magnitude 8.8, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, Ring Nebula is best seen from a dark site away from city lights, and when it is above the horizon depends on your latitude and the time of year. The visibility panel above works out tonight's viewing window for your saved location.

Why Ring Nebula is an anomaly nebula

Ring Nebula scores 90 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the anomaly tier. Another 30 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 8 science badges — Nebula, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), Messier object, Has a proper name, Planetary nebula (a dying star's shell), Coming towards us, Its dying star is still visible and The Ring Nebula — each earned for a real, measurable property of the object. Rarity on Spacedle is never random: the more remarkable an object's astrophysics, the more badges it collects, the higher it scores, and the rarer it ranks.