The recently fading Stingray Nebula photographed by the Hubble Telescope. look

The Stingray Nebula is the youngest known nebula of its kind in the universe. NASA recently released images from the Hubble Space Telescope which show the nebula to fade considerably over a period of two short decades.

According to a recent document released by NASA, the images are the clearest snapshots of a fading nebula ever captured.

You can see the side by side comparison of the nebula in a recent article of NASA Official Twitter Account:

For context, the document that accompanied the images explains that it takes millions of years for a star to form and for many stars to live billions of years before dying. Dying stars eject layers of colored gases that glow against the vastness of space, what we call nebulae.

According to Phys.org, the 2016 image shows drastic changes in the gas shells that surrounded the central star of the nebula. The blue fluorescent tendrils and gas filaments visible in the center of the 1996 image have all but disappeared from the 2016 image, along with the wavy edges that inspired the nebula’s aquatic name.

The Hubble Telescope official Twitter account recently used contrast images to participate in a popular meme format that circulates on the Internet:

Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield also posted images of the fading nebula on Twitter with the caption, “Like a candle blowing itself.”

Bruce Balick of the University of Washington in Seattle, responsible for new research on the Stingray Nebula, recently said:

“Changes in the nebulae have already been observed, but what we have here are changes in the fundamental structure of the nebula. In most studies, the nebula usually enlarges. Here, it fundamentally changes shape and weakens, and on an unprecedented time scale. Also, to our surprise, it doesn’t get bigger. This is because the once shiny inner elliptical ring seems to shrink as it fades, ”via Phys.org.

The team studying the fading nebula can only speculate on what new information its future may contain. According to NASA, if the Stingray Nebula continues to fade at its current rate, it will be barely detectable for the next 20 to 30 years.