The Gemini South telescope is turning 25, and astronomers are celebrating its birthday with a dazzling new image of the Butterfly Nebula.

Also cataloged as NGC 6302, this planetary nebula is located in the constellation Scorpius, the Scorpion. Its precise distance is unclear, but astronomers think it's between 2,500 and 3,800 light-years away.

At the heart of the Butterfly Nebula is a white dwarf radiating at an incredible 250,000 degrees Celsius (450,000 degrees Fahrenheit). It was once a normal star that was a bit more massive than the sun. But when it began to reach the end of its life, it expanded to become a red giant, which then cast off its outer layers to form the nebula. What remained was its hot core in the form of the white dwarf with a mass two-thirds that of the sun. This is

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