NASA captures 'future image' of Sun exploding and dying

The Hubble Space Telescope - operated jointly by NASA and ESA - has captured a beautiful nebula 1,370 light-years away, a Sun-like star that has just undergone a brilliant death.

The nebula, named NGC 2438 , has been called a "planetary nebula" as a mistake by astronomers in the past, because they look a bit like planets but are actually unrelated.

The spectacular nebula NGC 2438 - (Image: Hubble/NASA/ESA)

According to Science Alert, it is an almost perfect spherical giant gas cloud, displayed under modern telescopes in many beautiful colors. Nebula NGC 2438 is going through a period of just 10,000 years, when matter is ejected continuously and expands into space. After this stage, the nebula will become too faint to be seen.

It is only the later stages of death. According to NASA/ESA scientists, as the Sun nears the end of its lifespan, running out of hydrogen to fuse in its core, its core will first begin to cool and contract, disrupting the delicate balance between internal pressure and pressure. of gravity and pressure due to external heat-radiation.

This would bring more hydrogen out from the region around the core, ignite in the crust around the ring, and create a massive burst of energy that causes the Sun's outer layers to swell. It will become a red giant and is expected to swallow about four of the nearest planets, including Earth.

Then, the red giant gradually destabilized and spewed matter everywhere, eventually collapsing into a small but powerful white dwarf. The white dwarf continues to run out of energy and will explode again into a supernova, the remnants of which are beautiful stars.

It is estimated that our Sun will begin its slow death in about 5 billion years.