NGC 7662 otherwise referred to as the "Blue Snowball Nebula" is a planetary nebula located in the constellation Andromeda.

The distance to this nebula is not known with any real accuracy. According to the Skalnate Pleso Catalogue (1951) the distance of NGC 7662 is about 1,800 light years, the actual diameter about 20,000 AU. In a more recent survey of the brighter planetaries, C.R.O'Dell (1963) derived a distance of 1,740 parsecs or about 5,600 light years, increasing the actual size to 0.8 light year, or nearly 50,000 AU. It has a faint central star that is variable, with a magnitude range of 12 to 16.  The central star is a bluish dwarf with a continuous spectrum and a computed temperature of about 75,000K. The nuclei of the planetary nebulae are among the hottest stars known.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NGC_7662

 

ABOUT THE IMAGE

DATE/TIME:  Evening of September 7th, 2013.

CAMERA:  Canon XSI, 450Da

TELESCOPE:  Celestron C9.25 SCT @ F/20

ISO SETTING:  800

EXPOSURES:  10

EXPOSURE LENGTH:  300sec.

TOTAL EXPOSURE LENGTH:  50min.

SUBTRACTIONS: 16 dark frames and 10 bias frames.

CAPTURE: MaximDL

STACKING/PRE-PROCESSING: Deep Sky Stacker

PROCESSING: Photoshop CS3