The bright area at the lower left of this image, popularly
called "the jellyfish nebula" because of its shape, is
the remnant of a supernova explosion that occurred thousands
of years ago at a distance of 5000 light years from earth.
The exploding star was probably one of the massive but
short-lived (about 30 million years) variety. The expanding
material from the exploded star eventually ran into material
still left in the area from the cloud of gas and dust from which
the star had originally formed, and the shock waves from that
encounter produced the intricate structure of IC443. The larger
nebula that extends to the top of this image is cataloged as
Sharpless 2-249. This area is located in the constellation Gemini.

Image Detail:
Camera: STL-11000
Filter: 5nm hydrogen alpha
Exposure: 30 minutes x 6
Telescope: Takahashi FSQ-106N