PASADENA, CA (FOX Carolina) -
A new X-ray space image released by NASA has many talking about the object that looks like a hand, leaving some to nickname it the "Hand of God."
NASA said the hand-shaped object is a pulsar wind nebula that was the result of a star that blew up in a supernova explosion 17,000 light-years away.
Scientists don't know what is behind the image that is gaining more attention. It was captured by NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array, or NuSTAR, as the spinning material interacted with magnetic fields, it glows with X-rays.
"We don't know if the hand shape is an optical illusion," said Hongjun An of McGill University, Montreal, Canada, in an online release about the image. "With NuSTAR, the hand looks more like a fist, which is giving us some clues."
NuSTAR imaged the object with high-energy X-rays for the first time, though it had previously been detected by NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory.
The NuSTAR project launched into space June 13, 2012, in order to explore the high-energy X-ray universe. NuSTAR observes black holes, dead and exploded stars and other extreme objects in the Milky Way galaxy and beyond.
Click here to read more about what scientists say may be the reason for the shape and the mission.
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