In today's image, we see a young planetary nebula which is the end state of a star much like our own Sun. The core has collapsed down to an extremely dense white dwarf star while the outer layers have expanded and been expelled out into space. It is a relatively short-lived, but beautiful stage of a star's life.

My podcasts are available in video form through this YouTube Channel.

This Podcast is an authorized New Media Mirror Site for APOD. You can access the image and website directly at: Astronomy Picture of the Day. You can use the archive link below the image to select the photo corresponding to the date of this podcast.

I welcome comments and suggestions about these podcasts. I can be reached here: wagnerastronomy@gmail.com

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.