![\"two](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/JdPJ3Y8NuY7pVgMg38x6nZ.jpg\")
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Two ageing stars in the binary system AFGL 4106 sculpt a glowing, egg-shaped nebula as they approach the end of their lives. (Image credit: ESO\/G. Tomassini et al.)<\/p>\n
Astronomers have captured a spectacular scene of two ageing stars sculpting a cloud of gas and dust, forming an uneven glowing nebula, as they near the end of their lives.<\/p>\n
Using the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope, researchers imaged the binary star<\/a> system AFGL 4106, which sits at the heart of a dusty orange cocoon.<\/p>\n What is it? <\/p>\n At the center of the image are two dark dots, a pair of massive stars orbiting each other in a binary system. Like many stars<\/a> in our galaxy, they were born as a duo. Now they are nearing the end of their lives and shedding vast amounts of gas and dust into space.<\/p>\n You may like<\/p>\n A binary star system consists of two gravitationally bound stars orbiting a shared center of mass called a barycenter. In fact, most stars are not solitary like our sun, as scientists estimate up to 85% of all stars<\/a> exist in binary systems or systems with three or more stars.<\/p>\n The stars appear black because their intense brightness saturated the detector. To reveal the faint surrounding material, astronomers used the SPHERE instrument<\/a> on the VLT, which is specifically designed to handle extreme contrasts in light and to correct for the blurring effects of Earth’s atmosphere<\/a>.<\/p>\n Why is it amazing? <\/p>\n Instead of expanding out in a perfect sphere, the gas and dust appear warped and shifted into an almost egg-shaped cloud. The distortion is likely caused by the gravitational influence of the companion star, providing clear evidence that stellar partnerships can dramatically reshape how stars die.<\/p>\n These findings were recently published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics<\/a><\/p>\n Characterising the post-red supergiant binary system AFGL 4106 and its complex nebula with SPHERE\/VLT G. Tomassini, E. Lagadec, I. El Mellah, R. D. Oudmaijer, A. Chiavassa, M. N\u2019Diaye, P. de Laverny, N. Nardetto and A. Matter A&A, 706 (2026) A5 DOI: https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1051\/0004-6361\/202557705<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two ageing stars in the binary system AFGL 4106 sculpt a glowing, egg-shaped nebula as they approach the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":300632,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[111,139,69,147,392],"class_list":["post-300631","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-science","tag-space"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300631","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=300631"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300631\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/300632"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=300631"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=300631"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=300631"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}