Paper detail

Are planetary nebulae derived from multiple evolutionary scenarios?

Our understanding of planetary nebulae has been significantly enhanced as a result of several recent large surveys (Parker et al., these proceedings). These new discoveries suggest that the `PN phenomenon' is in fact more heterogeneous than previously envisaged. Even after the careful elimination of mimics from Galactic PN catalogues, there remains a surprising diversity in the population of PNe and especially their central stars. Indeed, several evolutionary scenarios are implicated in the formation of objects presently catalogued as PNe. We provide a summary of these evolutionary pathways and give examples of each. Eventually, a full census of local PNe can be used to confront both stellar evolution theory and population synthesis models.