The Robin's Egg Nebula, NGC 1360

An enigmatic object located in Fornax, having the appearance of a Robin's egg, its true nature was obscure for many years. It is now accepted to be a planetary nebula due to its strong radiation in the OIII bands, while the reddish emission is believed to be from matter ejected from the original star prior to the planetary nebula phase. One of the two red polar lobes is clearly seen to the left of the object. Its distance from us is a little uncertain in the region of 1500 ly. The central object was confirmed as binary only in 2017 and consists of a low-mass O-type star and white-dwarf companion.