Image captures violent death of a star

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PASADENA, Calif., Oct. 4 (UPI) -- A dying star is refusing to go quietly into the night and is throwing a cosmic "tantrum" captured in an image from two NASA space telescopes, astronomers say.

The image combines infrared and ultraviolet views from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope and the Galaxy Evolution Explorer telescope, which NASA has lent to the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, Calif.

As the star is dying, its dusty outer layers are unraveling into space, glowing from the intense ultraviolet radiation being pumped out by the hot stellar core, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory reported Wednesday.

As it dies, the star blows off its outer gaseous layers and leaves behind the tiny, hot, dense core, called a white dwarf.

GALEX has picked out the ultraviolet light pouring out of this cosmic end-of-life episode, shown in blue, while Spitzer has snagged the detailed infrared signature of the dust and gas in red, yellow and green, astronomers said.