The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has captured a dazzling image of a star about to go supernova in a massive explosion.
The picture, released by NASA on Tuesday (March 14), shows the star WR 124 in the middle of a spectacular cosmic cloud. As it goes supernova, the star, which is about 30 solar masses, is expelling its outer layers; so far, it has ejected more than 10 solar masses’ worth of material. This is a rarely seen phenomenon in some stars’ life cycle called the Wolf-Rayet (WR) phase.
“Massive stars race through their life cycles, and only some of them go through a brief Wolf-Rayet phase before going supernova, making Webb’s detailed observations of this rare phase valuable to astronomers,” NASA officials wrote in a description of the images.
“Writer Fuel” is a series of cool real-world stories that might inspire your little writer heart. Check out our Writer Fuel page on the LimFic blog for more inspiration.
