Central star in a planetary nebula reveals details of its life

Stars like our sun end their lives as white dwarfs. Some of them are surrounded by a planetary nebula consisting of gas ejected by the dying star shortly before its death. An international research team led by Professor Klaus Werner of the Institute of Astronomy and Astrophysics at the University of Tübingen has for the first time studied a central star of a planetary nebula located in an open star cluster.