The Butterfly Nebula, officially known as NGC 6302, earned its name from its distinctive wing like lobes that spread in opposite directions from a central dusty band. This striking shape isn't just beautiful, it's a natural laboratory where scientists can study the very processes that create the raw materials for rocky planets like Earth.

At the centre of this beautiful object lies one of the hottest known stellar cores in our Galaxy, blazing at 220,000 Kelvin. This ancient remnant of a Sun like star is surrounded by a doughnut shaped ring of dusty gas called a torus, which acts like a forge where planetary building blocks are born.

Test unit of the sunshield stacked and expanded at the Northrop Grumman facility in California, 2014 (Credit : Chris Gunn)

A recent study has revealed a wide variety of dust particles within this stellar graveyard. Most cosmic dust has a random, soot-like structure, but the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) revealed both crystalline dust grains that sparkle like tiny gemstones and irregular particles forming in more turbulent regions.

"We were able to see both cool gemstones formed in calm, long-lasting zones and fiery grime created in violent, fast-moving parts of space, all within a single object." - Dr. Mikako Matsuura from Cardiff University.

These dust particles are enormous by cosmic standards, about a millionth of a meter across which indicates they've been growing for extended periods. The torus contains crystalline silicates like quartz alongside more irregularly shaped grains, creating a diverse mixture of materials that could eventually become incorporated into forming planets.

The research also revealed fascinating chemical geography within the nebula. Different elements arrange themselves in layers based on how much energy they need to form ions. Iron and nickel trace distinctive jets blasting outward from the central star, while other elements settle at various distances depending on their energy requirements.

Perhaps most intriguingly though, the team discovered polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, or PAHs, complex carbon based molecules that form flat, ring like structures similar to honeycomb patterns. On Earth, we commonly find PAHs in campfire smoke, car exhaust, or burnt toast, but finding them in this oxygen rich environment was unexpected.

Meteorites like ALH840001 from Mars have revealed polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (Credit : NASA)

The researchers suspect these PAHs form when stellar winds create "bubbles" that burst into surrounding gas. This may be the first ever evidence of PAHs forming in an oxygen rich planetary nebula, providing crucial insights into how these potential building blocks for life can form in space.

For years, scientists have debated how cosmic dust like this forms and grows in the harsh environment of space. The Butterfly Nebula offers a unique window into these processes because it contains both calm regions where crystalline dust can slowly form and violent areas where particles are rapidly created and destroyed. Understanding these processes helps scientists trace the journey from stellar death to planetary birth. These tiny particles eventually clump together through gravitational attraction, forming the asteroids, comets, and rocky planets that populate solar systems.