Astronomy Archives - Page 39 of 71

October 4, 2020December 16, 2020

10/2/2020 Mars

Here’s my best Mars since 2015. Over on the left, that area that looks a little like Africa or a hair dryer is Syrtis Major. That is the first documented land feature on another planet. The large roughly circular area between it and the tiny south polar region is, I think, the Hellas Basin.This was taken from the River Ridge Observatory Friday the 2nd with my 11” at f/10 and my ZWO ASI462MC camera. Best 33% of 34,000 frames. Mars was low when I took this, just about 20 degrees above the horizon. I should and will another time wait for it to get higher.

September 13, 2020December 16, 2020

9/11/2020 The Wizard Nebula

This was shot with my 11″ SCT, Hyperstar, ASI 294 MC Pro, and L-eNhance narrowband filter.

NGC 7380 (also known as the Wizard Nebula) is an open cluster discovered by Caroline Herschel in 1787. William Herschel included his sister’s discovery in his catalog, and labelled it H VIII.77. It is also known as 142 in the 1959 Sharpless catalog (Sh2-142). This reasonably large nebula is located in Cepheus. It is extremely difficult to observe visually, usually requiring very dark skies and an O-III filter.
Located 7200 light years away, the Wizard nebula, surrounds developing open star cluster NGC 7380. Visually, the interplay of stars, gas, and dust has created a shape that appears to some like a fictional medieval sorcerer. The active star forming region spans about 100 light years, making it appear larger than the angular extent of the Moon. The Wizard Nebula can be located with a small telescope toward the constellation of the King of Aethiopia (Cepheus). Although the nebula may last only a few million years, some of the stars being formed may outlive our Sun.

September 13, 2020April 4, 2021

9/6/2020 The Pinwheel Galaxy

This was taken with my 11″ SCT, Hyperstar, ASI 294 MC Pro, and Optolong L-Pro filter to reduce light pollution.

The Pinwheel Galaxy (also known as Messier 101, M101 or NGC 5457) is a face-on spiral galaxy distanced 21 million light-years (six megaparsecs) away from Earth in the constellation Ursa Major. It was discovered by Pierre Méchain on March 27, 1781 and was communicated to Charles Messier, who verified its position for inclusion in the Messier Catalogue as one of its final entries.