Related papers: Molecular studies of Planetary Nebulae
Many complex organic molecules and inorganic solid-state compounds have been observed in the circumstellar shell of stars (both C-rich and O-rich) in the transition phase between Asymptotic Giant Branch (AGB) stars and Planetary Nebulae…
Most planetary nebulae (PNe) show beautiful, axisymmetric morphologies despite their progenitor stars being essentially spherical. Close binarity is widely invoked to help eject an axisymmetric nebula, after a brief phase of engulfment of…
The Planetary Nebulae (PNe) return nuclear processed stellar material back to the interstellar medium (ISM) and thus have an important influence on the chemical evolution of our Galaxy. We present results of a survey of PNe in decay which…
Planetary nebulae (PNe) constitute an important tool to study the chemical evolution of the Milky Way and other galaxies, probing the nucleosynthesis processes, abundance gradients and the chemical enrichment of the interstellar medium. In…
Planetary nebulae (PN) are an excellent laboratory to investigate the nucleosynthesis and chemical evolution of intermediate mass stars. In these objects accurate abundances can be obtained for several chemical elements that are…
Interaction with the Interstellar Medium (ISM) cannot be ignored in understanding planetary nebula (PN) evolution and shaping. In an effort to understand the range of shapes observed in the outer envelopes of PNe, we have run a…
We report high-sensitivity millimetre observations of several molecular species (13CO, HCN, HNC, CN, HCO+ and N2H+) in a sample of compact planetary nebulae. Some species such as HCO+ and CN are particularly abundant compared to envelopes…
Planetary Nebulae (PNe) are the result of heavy mass loss of the asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stars. They are understood in terms of Kwok's (1978) interacting-winds model as the product of the mass-loss history on the AGB and the central…
Planetary nebulae (PNe) are circumstellar gas ejected during an intense mass-losing phase in the the lives of asymptotic giant branch stars. PNe have a stunning variety of shapes, most of which are not spherically symmetric. The debate over…
The high mass loss rates of stars in their asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stage of evolution is one of the most important pathways for mass return from stars to the ISM. In the planetary nebulae (PNe) phase, the ejected material is…
Planetary nebulae (PNe) have three main components: a central star (CS), ionised gas and dust in the nebula. Each of them contains critical chemical fingerprints of their evolution, serving as tracers of the evolution, nucleosynthesis and…
Planetary nebulae (PN) represent the evolutionary fate of the asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stellar envelopes, thus are ideally suited to study the chemical impact of AGB stars. Stellar evolution predict elemental enrichment through the AGB…
Most planetary nebulae (PNe) show beautiful, axisymmetric morphologies despite their progenitor stars being essentially spherical. Angular momentum provided by a close binary companion is widely invoked as the main agent that would help…
Planetary nebulae (PNe) represent the near endpoints of evolution for stars of initial mass $\sim$1-8 $M_\odot$, wherein the envelope of an asymptotic giant branch (AGB) star becomes photodissociated and ionized by high-energy radiation…
Planetary Nebulae represent a powerful window into the evolution of low-intermediate mass stars that have undergone extensive mass-loss. The nebula manifests itself in an extremely wide variety of shapes, but exactly how the mass lost is…
We study the chemical abundances of a wide sample of 142 Galactic planetary nebulae (PNe) with good quality observations, for which the abundances have been derived more or less homogeneously, thus allowing a reasonable comparison with…
High spatial resolution images of PNe have shown their extremely complex morphology. However, the circumstellar envelopes of their progenitors, the AGB stars, are strikingly spherical. In order to understand the carving processes leading to…
Extra-galactic planetary nebulae (PNe) permit the study of dust and molecules in metallicity environments other than the Galaxy. Their known distances lower the number of free parameters in the observations vs. models comparison, providing…
During the asymptoyic giant branch (AGB) phase, different elements are dredge-up to the stellar surface depending on progenitor mass and metallicity. When the mass loss increases at the end of the AGB, a circumstellar dust shell is formed,…
We analyse the planetary nebulae (PNe) population of the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC), based on evolutionary models of stars with metallicities in the range $10^{-3} \leq Z \leq 4\times 10^{-3}$ and mass $0.9 M\odot < M < 8M\odot$, evolved…