M106 (lower left) and NGC 4217 (upper right) // Timo Kubach

Pillars of creation

The Pillars of Creation were first made famous when NASA's Hubble Space Telescope captured an image of them in 1995. These pillars appear like rock formations – three towers of gas and dust which are more permeable than they look. The Pillars of Creation are part of the Eagle Nebula, also known as Messier 16.Some 7,000 light-years from Earth are gigantic cosmic columns of dust and gas. Because new stars are coalescing there, the formation is known as the Pillars of Creation

Planet surfaces

This magnificent spiral galaxy is Messier 64 (M64), often called the Black Eye Galaxy or the Sleeping Beauty Galaxy. It’s nickname comes from its dark-lidded appearance in telescopic views. The spiral's central region, about 7,400 light-years across, is pictured in this reprocessed image from the Hubble Space Telescope. M64 lies some 17 million light-years away in the otherwise well-groomed northern constellation Coma Berenices. The enormous dust clouds partially obscuring M64's central region are filled with young, blue star clusters and the reddish glow of hydrogen associated with star forming regions. But imposing clouds of dust are not this galaxy's only peculiar feature. Observations show that M64 is actually composed of two concentric, counter-rotating systems. While all the stars in M64 rotate in the same direction as the interstellar gas in the galaxy's central region, gas in the outer regions, extending to about 40,000 light-years, rotates in the opposite direction. The dusty eye and bizarre rotation are likely the result of a billion year old merger of two different galaxies.

Image Credit: NASA, ESA, Hubble, HLA; Processing: Jonathan Lodge

M17 by NASA Hubble

It occurred to me that since I was last on Tumblr, I got a new astrophotography setup. I've only used it a few times, but most nights I'd rather haul out Lyra the Dob for a quick and easy setup.

The scope part of the new rig arrived the day before I left for a week-long trip to dark skies as a mentor at an astronomy camp. I got the go-ahead to bring it; the seeing was bad all week so the stars were bloated, but I still had a great time.

From that week:

At top left is Messier 109; the bright star is the bottom-left corner of the Big Dipper's cup. I'd chosen it for first light because I'd never imaged it before and it has a beautiful barred spiral structure. In this cropped version you can see the structure and three faint satellite galaxies to the right, running in a row from above the galaxy to just below and right of it.

The one at bottom right is the Coma Galaxy Cluster. The seeing made it hard to tell, but *most* of the points of light in that image are individual galaxies and not stars. I could see a few dozen through my visual scope one night. It was glorious.

M1 - The Crab Nebula in Taurus. An expanding supernova remnant and pulsar wind nebula 6,500 ly from Earth.

Best astrophoto I’ve taken in 10 years.

The Whirlpool galaxy. Image by @xipteras

Needed new songs for my playlist and Tate McRae always provides.

M80 !

M80 is one of the densest globular clusters in the Milky Way. It's about 28,000 light-years away from Earth and contains hundreds of thousands of stars.

Courtesy: Nasa

Day 13: Fear

Necrotic shroud

The star Antares (α Scorpii) // Gaillard Jérôme

Note the globular cluster M4 to the lower right!

The Trifid (M20, NGC 6514) & The Lagoon Nebula  ( M8, NGC 6523)

Constellation Sagittarius.

Distance to Earth: 5.200 & 4.100 light years.

DSLR Canon Rebel T3i

Montcada i Reixac (Bortle 8)

Messier-17 has several names: the Swan, the Omega, the Horseshoe. It is an intense star-forming region that is nearby, on a galactic scale (5,000 light years distance).

The predominant pink colour suggests hydrogen heated by several intense young stars in the bright centre.

Our eyes are drawn to the swirling dust and gas surrounding the intense core of the nebula.

I photographed Messier-17 from my balcony in Strasbourg France on three nights in July 2023. This is a composite of 57 x 3 minute exposures.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omega_Nebula

Magnificent spiral galaxy NGC 4565, also known as the Needle Galaxy, is viewed edge-on from Earth. This sharp, colorful image reveals the galaxy's boxy, bulging central core, obscured by dust lanes. NGC 4565 itself lies about 40 million light-years from Earth and spans about 100,000 light-years. Easily spotted with small telescopes, sky enthusiasts consider NGC 4565 to be a prominent celestial masterpiece Messier missed.

Image Credit & Copyright: Michael Sherick

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