- NGC 6990 Veil Nebula
The Veil Nebula in the constellation Cygnus is probably the best known supernova remnant (SNR) after the Crab Nebula (M 1). While the overall object has the designation NGC 6990, other identifiers are given to different parts of the SNR structure. The Eastern Veil (on the left side of my image) is designated NGC 6992, while the Western Veil (on the right side of my image) is designated NGC 6960. Several other small portions also have NGC numbers. The shell of gas that represents the SNR is expanding at a speed of around 600,000 km/hr and has a diameter on the order of 100 LY. It is thought to be around 1470 LY away. Visually, it spans approximately 3 degrees against the backdrop of the Milky Way (around 6 times the diameter of the full moon). Since its discovery in 1784 by William Herschel, the Veil Nebula has been studied by numerous astronomers. While a number of radio and X-ray sources have been found within the region of the nebula, the remnant of the star at its center that exploded has not been positively identified.
This nebula is too large to fit into a single image frame using the SOCO imaging system. To produce the image shown above, I mosaiced seven separate color composite images of the nebula, with each color composite image created from five 6-minute exposures in the red, green and blue spectral bands.
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