This incredible picture of cosmic chaos shows a dying star ejecting shells of material outwards into space.
The extended lobes and twisted knots of gas and dust have earned the object, NGC 6537, the nickname Red Spider Nebula.
And the James Webb Space telescope is revealing the secrets of the Red Spider like never before.
The dying throes of a star like our own
The Red Spider Nebula is a type of cosmic cloud known as a planetary nebula.
These amazing objects give us a future glimpse of how our our Sun might end its life, as planetary nebulae are the final stages of a Sun-like star.
Having exhausted much of its fuel, the star balloons into a cool red giant, then casts its outer layers into space.
This exposes the star's white hot core, and ultraviolet light from the dense stellar remnant lights up the cast-off material, causing it to glow.
Many planetary nebulae appear like rounded, puffed-out objects, which is why they are known as 'planetary', even though they don't have anything to do with planets.
The Red Spider Nebula, however, looks anything but spherical. Its long, spindly structure and central 'body' is what's earned it the 'spider' nickname.
Exploring the Red Spider
The James Webb Space Telescope used its Near-InfraRed Camera (NIRCam) instrument to give astronomers a new view of the Red Spider Nebula.
Because Webb views the cosmos in infrared, it can reveal objects that aren't normally visible with the human eye.
In the case of the Red Spider Nebula, the James Webb Space Telescope has given astronomers a view of never-before-seen details in the cloud, against a backdrop of thousands of stars.
We can clearly see the central star of the Red Spider Nebula glowing in infrared, much brighter than the dusty gas that surrounds it.
In optical images, for example those captured by the Hubble Space Telescope, the star appears faint and blue.
Webb has also revealed a shroud of hot dust around the central star.
A companion for the spider star?
Although we can only see a single star at the heart of the Red Spider Nebula, astronomers say it may have a hidden companion.
They say that might explain why the nebula has such a unique shape, as a second star would explain its narrow waist and wide outflows.
A similar hourglass shape is seen in other planetary nebulae like the Butterfly Nebula, which Webb also observed.
Webb reveals the full extent of the Red Spider Nebula's outstretched lobes, forming the ‘legs’ of the spider.
The lobes, seen in blue, are traced by light emitted from H2 molecules.
These lobes are bubble-like structures, each stretching about three lightyears across.
Gas flowing from the centre of the nebula has inflated the bubbles over thousands of years.
Webb's view of the Red Spider Nebula shows more gas jetting out from the nebula’s centre.
The purple ‘S’ shape at the heart of the nebula follows light from ionised iron atoms.
This marks where a jet is shooting outwards from near the central star and smashing into cast-off material, creating the twisted, rippling structure seen here.
