The kernel file, in Ubuntu, is stored in your /boot folder and is called vmlinuz-version. The name vmlinuz comes from the unix world where they used to call their kernels simply “unix” back in the 60?s so Linux started calling their kernel “linux” when it was first developed in the 90?s.
When virtual memory was developed for easier multitasking abilities, “vm” was put at the front of the file to show that the kernel supports virtual memory. For a while the Linux kernel was called vmlinux, but the kernel grew too large to fit in the available boot memory so the kernel image was compressed and the ending x was changed to a z to show it was compressed with zlib compression. This same compression isn’t always used, often replaced with LZMA or BZIP2, and some kernels are simply called zImage.
The version numbering will be in the format A.B.C.D where A.B will probably be 2.6, C will be your version, and D indicates your patches or fixes.
In the /boot folder there will also be other very important files called initrd.img-version, system.map-version, and config-version. The initrd file is used as a small RAM disk that extracts and executes the actual kernel file. The system.map file is used for memory management before the kernel fully loads, and the config file tells the kernel what options and modules to load into the kernel image when the it is being compiled.
