I took this photo in remote Idaho. This is part of a supernova explosion that occurred 10,000 years ago. I photographed the entire supernova last year (the "Veil Nebula").
The wisps of gas in the Veil Nebula are all that's left of a star 20 times the size of our sun. The star's explosion sent debris outward at over a million miles per hour. These shock waves heat the air, which cools, and continues to produce the brilliant colors associated with the ionized hydrogen, sulphur, and oxygen gasses. Supernova explosions are responsible for creating all elements heavier than iron--the same elements used to create planets (including our own).
The specific part of the Veil Nebula in the photograph you're now looking at is known as "Pickering's Triangle" or, more appropriately, "Williamina Fleming's Triangular Wisp."
Edward Pickering ran the Harvard College Observatory in the early 1900s. Pickering's wife suggested that their housemaid, a single mother named Williamina Fleming, be given a shot at working in the observatory. Williamina did administrative work for 2 years before she was invited to join an all-women club called the "Harvard Computers." Despite their name, no computers were involved. The term "Computers" was used to describe people so good at math that they "computed" for a living. This 80-person team reviewed data from the observatory (measured the brightness, position, and color of stars). They were so efficient that Pickering said, the loss of *one minute* of the Harvard Computers' time would be the same as losing 2 years of work from a full time astronomy assistant.
Williamina discovered the Triangular Wisp we see in the photo by using "photographic plates." A special coating was put on a glass plate, which was then exposed to light, and developed in a dark room. Astronomers in the early 1900s used these glass plates in the same way as we use digital photos today. Williamina became the editor for all published studies at the Harvard College Observatory and created a system for classifying stars, the "Pickering-Fleming" system. This star classification system formed the basis for how we still classify stars today.
High resolution image here (click "Full Resolution" button at the top right): https://astrob.in/full/0773mx/0/
