Picture of the Day · NASA
PK 164 +31.1: The Headphone Nebula
2026-05-27
What is a pair of headphones doing in the sky? Today’s image features the Headphone Nebula, also known as PK 164 +31.1 or Jones-Emberson 1. This planetary nebula, the remnant of a dying Sun-like star, faintly occupies an angular region of the Lynx constellation about 1/5th the diameter of the full moon. The red and blue-ish green colors trace hydrogen and oxygen atoms, respectively, that have been excited and ionized by the nebula's central white dwarf. The headphone shape, where two lobes of hydrogen puncture the inner region of oxygen, adds this object to a long list of oddly shaped nebulae. The morphology of such strange nebulae hint at the presence of a stellar or planetary companion, which can stir the material flowing out from the dying star. You can listen to Hubble and JWST sonifications of planetary nebulae through your very own headphones!
via NASA APOD
Key facts
- Discovered by
- K. Reinmuth
- Discovery site
- Heidelberg Obs.
- Discovery date
- 31 August 1929
- Named after
- Arabian Peninsula
- Alternative designations
- 1929 QC · 1955 EC
- Minor planet category
- main-belt · ( outer ) , background
- Observation arc
- 87.58 yr (31,987 days)
- Aphelion
- 3.6412 AU
- Perihelion
- 2.7221 AU
- Semi major axis
- 3.1816 AU
- Orbital period sidereal
- 5.68 yr (2,073 days)
- Mean anomaly
- 195.98 °
- Mean motion
- 0° 10 25.32 / day
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- asteroid
- Named after
- Arabian Peninsula
- Followed by
- 1158 Luda
- Follows
- Q136581
- Parent body
- Sun
- Minor-planet group
- asteroid belt
- Diameter
- +29.113
- Orbital period
- +2076.176991966624
Show 3 more facts
- P65
Article
1157 Arabia, provisional designation 1929 QC, is an asteroid from the outer regions of the asteroid belt, approximately 29 kilometers in diameter. Astronomer Karl Reinmuth discovered it at the Heidelberg Observatory in southwest Germany on 31 August 1929. The asteroid was named for the Arabian Peninsula.
Orbit and classification