AAPOD2 Image Archives
Simeis 147, The Spaghetti Nebula
Simeis 147, commonly known as the Spaghetti Nebula, is an enormous and extremely faint supernova remnant located in the constellation Taurus. Spanning nearly three degrees on the sky, it is the expanding debris field from a stellar explosion that occurred roughly 40,000 years ago at a distance of about 3,000 light-years. The nebula’s characteristic appearance comes from long, tangled filaments of ionized hydrogen and oxygen, shaped by shock waves propagating through the surrounding interstellar medium as the remnant continues to expand and dissipate.
This narrowband view was captured from Forca Canapine in the Parco Nazionale dei Monti Sibillini in the Marche region of Italy, a high-altitude site well suited for deep-sky imaging. Using an Optolong L-Ultimate filter, the image isolates hydrogen and oxygen emission, allowing the delicate filamentary network to emerge despite the nebula’s extremely low surface brightness. The result highlights both the chaotic structure left behind by the supernova and the slow return of enriched material to the galaxy, where it will eventually contribute to future generations of stars.