The California Nebula

Since it's pretty hard to top the recent discovery of inflation, I thought I'd just post a pretty picture for my final blog.

From Nasa's Astronomy Picture of the Day

I first saw this Nebula at the Palomar Visitor's Center.  It is named the California Nebula because it roughly resembles the shape of California (obviously) and it was discovered by E.E. Barnard; the guy Barnard's Star is named after.  According to Wikipedia, the light of this nebula is caused by Balmer beta emission lines from photons that hit the gas from a nearby O7-star that then releases the photon again at visible wavelengths.  It is very hard to see this with no filters so Wikipedia recommends that you use a Balmer beta filter if you wish to see this for yourself.