The Dumbbell Nebula

Also known as the Apple Core nebula and NGC6853, M27 is a planetary nebula located in the constellation Vulpecula 1,360 ly from Earth. At an apparent magnitude of +7.5, this was the first planetary nebula discovered.

With a compact size of 8 arcminutes the average surface brightness is 11.2 making it a relatively popular target for amateur astrophotographers as well as for observational astronomy.

The white dwarf star at the centre of the nebula , from which the material in the nebula was ejected, is the largest known.