The James Webb Space Telescope has captured detailed images of the Lion's Head Nebula (NGC 2392) using its NIRCam and MIRI instruments. The nebula is the remnant of a Sun-like star that exhausted the nuclear fusion in its core and began shedding layers of gas and dust into space.
A hot stellar core called a white dwarf remains at the center of the structure, located within what appears as the lion's nose in the nebula's distinctive shape. Intense radiation from the white dwarf ionizes the surrounding gas as it expands outward, creating the irregular bubble that forms the lion's face.
Dust clumps that have survived the white dwarf's radiation make up portions of the nebula, while a cloud of ionized gas creates the lion's mane. The new images will help scientists better understand how gas and dust interact with each other and with white dwarf radiation.
