stars: AGB and post-AGB

Surprising detection of an equatorial dust lane on the AGB star IRC+10216

Aims: Understanding the formation of planetary nebulae remains elusive because in the preceding asymptotic giant branch (AGB) phase these stars are heavily enshrouded in an optically thick dusty envelope. Methods: To further understand the morphology …

The color dependent morphology of the post-AGB star HD 161796

Context. Many protoplanetary nebulae show strong asymmetries in their surrounding shells, pointing to asymmetries during the mass loss phase. Questions concerning the origin and the onset of deviations from spherical symmetry are important for our …