The heart of the Vela supernova remnant

This is an image of the central region of the Vela supernova remnant, showing emission created by 'winds' from the active dead star (a pulsar) at the heart of the remnant. This image is in so-called 'polarised emission', where we measure the tendency for the radio waves to oscillate in a preferred direction. In Vela, the preferred direction is caused by a strong magnetic field. The 'cracks' in the image are regions where the preferred direction of oscillation is scrambled by visps of intervening material.

ATCA 21cm continuum image by D. Bock, R. Sault, A. Green and D. Milne.