Helix Nebula

Helix Nebula (NGC 7293)

The Helix Nebula, also known as NGC 7293, is a large planetary nebula located about 215 pc from Sol along a Coreward by Corespinward bearing at 036.2^o Galactic Longitude and -57.1^o South Galactic Latitude.

• It is an astrographic feature and a nebula.

Description (Specifications)

The Helix Nebula has sometimes been referred to as the "Eye of God" ("L'oeil de Dieu") as well as the "Eye of Sauron".

The nebula is shaped like a prolate spheroid with strong density concentrations toward the filled disk along the equatorial plane. The size of the inner disk is about 0.52 pc in diameter, the outer torus is about 0.77 pc in diameter, and the outer-most ring is about 1.76 pc in diameter.

The Helix Nebula contains highly radially symmetric "cometary" knots (i.e. its main ring contains knots of nebulosity that have the appearance of "comets" to astronmical observers), each containing bright cusps (local photoionization fronts) and tails. Excluding the tails, the knots are (very approximately) the size of the Sol system, and each of the cusp knots is optically thick. There are estimated to be more than 20,000 knots in the nebula.

The remains of the original star that formed this planetary nebula is the white degenerate dwarf at its center (stellar class "D").

Monostellar System

Helix Core Remnant Monostellar System

Star Name	Hierarchy	Category		Mass (Sol)	Temp (K)	Luminosity (Sol)
Helix Core Remnant DA	Primary	White Dwarf		0.36	14000 - 14000	0.005
	Unit	Diameter	Min Distance	Hab Zone	Jump Shadow	M-Drive Limit
	AU	0.00016	0.00587	0.06 - 0.09	0.016	0.16
	Orbit #	*	*	*	*	0
	Remarks
	None

History & Background (Dossier)

The Helix Nebula is located in the Helix Subsector of the Vanguard Reaches Sector.

• It is studied locally by the Helix Institute.

The myths of the Zhdianshe of Dablrel tie the emerges of psionic powers in their people to the 'Death of the Bright Eye', the demise of the red giant that became the Helix Nebula. When the Bright Eye star, known in Zhdianshe pre-history for its variable nature and hazy appearance from previous eruptions, faded for the last time, it was a major event on Dablrel despite the Helix being nearly 30 parsecs distant.

Image Repository

TravellerMap (T5SS):
[1]

Worlds & Sectors (Astrography)

This astrographic feature is primarily found in the following areas:
Charted Space:

• Vanguard Reaches Sector
  • Helix Subsector

World Listing: 1105

The following systems and worlds are associated with this astrographic feature:

No world articles for Helix Nebula

References & Contributors (Sources)

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This page uses content from Wikipedia. The original article was at Helix_Nebula. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. The text of Wikipedia is available under the Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

This list of sources was used by the Traveller Wiki Editorial Team and individual contributors to compose this article. Copyrighted material is used under license from Far Future Enterprises or by permission of the author. The page history lists all of the contributions.

• Paranoia Press: Vanguard Reaches
• Paranoia Press: Vanguard Reaches 1991 Online Updates by Chuck Kallenbach
• Traveller Wiki Editorial Team
• Author & Contributor: WHULorigan
• Author & Contributor: Lord (Marquis) and Master of Sophontology Maksim-Smelchak of the Ministry of Science