Stuff in the Sky

Kenneth Yong said:
Very nice, Canuck, but, urm, there're quite a few zeros missing from the age, don't you think 🤔😀?

Thanks much for sharing,
Kenneth
Click to expand...

Nope, its age is estimated to be 10600 years (+2300/−1200 years), based on the ratio of its size to its measured expansion rate of 31 km·s−1.[6]
Planetary nebulae are a type of emission nebula consisting of an expanding, glowing shell of ionized gas ejected from red giant stars late in their lives.[2]
ie, these can be pretty young, astronomically speaking that is.

Cheers
 
SilverFly said:
FINALLY some new JWST eye candy. The Tarantula Nebula, a star forming region 161,000 light years away in the large Magellanic Cloud:

View attachment 30907
Click to expand...

This is one I would love to try an capture, unfortunately, only visible in the southern hemisphere (or way out wherever JWST is) - "Honey, have another great reason to go to New Zealand!!!"

cheers
 
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Second try at this target; first effort I blew out the central core, overexposed at 240 second exposures, so it's a pretty bright little target:

M27, commonly referred to as the Dumbbell Nebula, like the Helix Nebula ( #99 ), is a planetary-type nebula in the constellation Vulpecula (Little Fox) and the first of this type to be discovered, by, you guessed it by the M-designation, Charles Messier. Messier described it in 1764 as an oval nebula without stars. Some 20 years later in 1784, William Herschel came up with the name "Planetary Nebula", because he thought these formations resembled his newly discovered planet, Uranus. The visual magnitude of M27 is 7.4, actually not as bright in magnitude as the Helix Nebula (7.3); however, the Dumbbell has higher surface brightness due to its smaller size (thus the shorter exposure needed).

How far is the Dumbbell from us, you ask. Well, as with most planetary nebulae it's a bit of an unknown; current estimates range from 490 to 3500 light years. Using its angular rate of expansion, the Dumbbell has been estimated to have an age of no more than 14,600 years (Moreno-Corral et al. 1992).

The Dumbbell Nebula, 100 x 120 second light exposures, 50 darks, OIII/H-alpha duo-narrowband filter, essentially no cropping:

Dumbbell Nebula - 09-09-2022-PS copy.jpg

Facts brought to you by SkySafari 6 Pro.

Cheers
 
And again, under the "What were they thinking" category ;


New Scientist: BlueWalker 3: Massive satellite could become the brightest object in the night sky.
www.newscientist.com

Huge satellite could outshine all stars and planets in the night sky

Astronomers are concerned that the BlueWalker 3 satellite, which will use an antenna the size of a squash court to beam internet to mobile phones, could outshine everything in the night sky except for the moon
www.newscientist.com www.newscientist.com
 
The Pelican Nebula sits just off the east coast of the North America Nebula, pretty cool if you ask me.

Finally had a few nights of clear sky and somewhat lower humidity, so got out to do some imaging. The Pelican Nebula (IC 5070) is an emission nebula in the constellation Cygnus (the Swan). Th Pelican is about 2,000 light-years away, with a linear diameter of 30 light-years.

Pelican Nebula:75 x 240 second light exposures, 50 darks; multispectra filter:

Pelican Nebula-PS copy.jpg

The North America nebula (NGC 7000) also in the Cygnus constellation, is part of the same HII as the Pelican Nebula, but it is generally brighter an is much larger. cIt measures 3 degrees north to south and 2.3 degrees east to west, and covers an area in the sky of more than four times the size of the full moon. NGC 7000 was discovered by William Herschel on October 24th, 1786 from Slough, England. Under optimal dark-sky conditions, the North America Nebula can be seen with the unaided eyed appears as a Milky Way smudge due east of Deneb (the brightest star in Cynus and the 19th brightest overall in the sky).

The North America Nebula: 40 x 240 second light exposures, 50 darks; multispectra filter (my framing was a little off, cutting off the upper northeast coast):

North America Nebula-PS copy.jpg

Edited to make images a little smaller.

Cheers
 
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Tonight, if skies are clear, check out Jupiter, making its closest pass to earth since 1963, a mere 591 million kilometers (367 million miles) from Earth, practically spittin' distance.

skyandtelescope.org

Jupiter's Exceptionally Close Opposition

A sentinel in the autumnal sky, Jupiter marks its closest opposition since 1963. Get out these nights to enjoy the sight.
skyandtelescope.org skyandtelescope.org

cheers
 
Viewing has been a bit of a challenge here in NC. First-off, very few clear nights, second, being at sea level means a lot more atmospheric interference compared with the 3500 ft in Bend, or the 7000 ft at my former higher elevation dark sky site, and finally, the humidity adds even more interference than the dry atmosphere of Bend, so all things considered, relatively happy with the end result below.

NGC 7635, commonly referred to as the Bubble Nebula, is a 12th magnitude planetary nebula in the constellation Cassiopeia. The nebula is energized by the hot central star, SAO 20575, which is thought to be about 45 times more massive than our sun and is expected to detonate as a supernova in 10 million to 20 million years. "Gas on the star gets so hot that it escapes away into space as a "stellar wind" moving at over 4 million miles per hour. This outflow sweeps up the cold, interstellar gas in front of it, forming the outer edge of the bubble much like a snowplow piles up snow in front of it as it moves forward. As the surface of the bubble's shell expands outward, it slams into dense regions of cold gas on one side of the bubble. This asymmetry makes the star appear dramatically off-center from the bubble" (Hubblesite: https://hubblesite.org/contents/media/images/2016/13/3725-Image.html) with its location at about 9 o'clock in the "bubble" in the cropped image below. NGC 7635 is about 11,000 light years from earth. The "bubble" in NGC 7635 is about 10 light years across.

NGC 7635 (Bubble Nebula) with the open-star cluster M 52 at about 7 o'clock: 50 x 300 second light exposures, 30 darks;OIII/H-alpha duo-narrowband filter, essentially no cropping:

Bubble Nebula-2 copy.jpg

Cropped to show off the "bubble" - note the yellow-white supergiant SAO 20575 at about 9 o'clock in the bubble:

Bubble Nebula-2 copy-cropped.jpg

Information from SkySafari 6 Pro and the "Hubblesite" (https://hubblesite.org/).

cheers
 
The same moon seen from the Old Continent, two nights ago. We didn't get that nice "orange" color.

Taken with the S22 Ultra using its 30X digital zoom, cropped and adjusted in camera, no sharpening applied. I think it looks better than the previous photo I took (post #60 above), I like the "bumpiness" of the moon's surface. I suspect the color fringing was caused by shooting through a window, couldn't get it open.

AL9nZEWFWwz6R91VOX6QqHAjWxjoe4ifYuMpPNHt-GrU42P0RgxKutmvEADiSTG0bhJrucUlBga9yrXTRnxIGwjaiycxG8qm8HQ3gSG4maVVUoieVDKao44Lt-mWOqBIQt_Ps9KMmU-oFgEuKJjKkbPGvdRl=w945-h966-no


Kenneth
 
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