M57

Not much of a photograph you may be thinking, and yet.... This image was created by photons of light striking my camera's sensor tonight after travelling for 2,300 years across space. So what you are actually doing here is looking at an image from about 300BC. I'm old school by the way.
Astronomy blows your mind. The object is known as a planetary nebula because through a small telescope it resembles the appearance of a planet. Indeed this nebula is about the same visual size as Jupiter. In reality it is some 1.3 light years in diameter.
These objects form when a star of a given mass reaches the end of its life and blows away it's outer atmosphere.
Who'd have thought!
Oh yes, the title. M57 is the catalogue designation of the nebula in Charles Messier's list of objects that could be confused for comets. He was a French astronomer of the 18th century.