(NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Webb / ERO Production Team https://bit.ly/3JGfdDn)
The James Webb Space Telescope - JWST has obtained a detailed image of the nebula around the star Wolf-Rayet (WR 124).
It is expected that in the near future the star will explode as a supernova.
Wolf-Rayet stars represent one of the final stages in the evolution of very massive stars.
They have almost completely exhausted the reserves of hydrogen in their core, passing to the nuclear combustion of helium and heavier elements.
These are extremely bright and hot luminaries, many of which are part of massive double stars.
A special feature of such objects is the powerful, high-speed winds they generate, which is why many Wolf-Rayet stars have nebulae.
Such stars are believed to be the progenitors of type Ib and type Ic supernovae.
GOING BOOM
WR 124 is a Wolf-Rayet star located 15,000 light-years from the Sun in the constellation Sagittarius.
It is 33 times more massive than the Sun and has a luminosity that exceeds the Sun's by 150 thousand and is surrounded by an extensive gas and dust nebula.
Also, that gas is 10 times more massive than the Sun.
The nebula around WR 124 has previously been observed optically by the Hubble telescope.
However, the near and mid-infrared instruments NIRCam and MIRI by JWST have obtained a more detailed image of it.
The nebula is about 10 light-years across and is not composed of smooth shells of gas and dust, but of individual asymmetric outbursts of matter that have taken place over the past ten thousand years.
The clumps of gas and dust take on the shape of tadpoles due to the action of the stellar winds of WR 124 on them.
WR 124 is expected to explode as a supernova in the next few hundred thousand years.
Sources:
Webb Telescope: https://webbtelescope.org/contents/news-releases/2023/news-2023-111
ESA: https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Webb/Webb_captures_rarely_seen_prelude_to_a_supernova
CNN: https://edition.cnn.com/2023/03/14/world/webb-telescope-wolf-rayet-star-scn/index.html
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