n2362-300secX4_median_log_cropped_psped
Taken in 2009-10 with the Starshooter Pro V1 single shot color cooled CCD camera shortly after receiving it. Used the 6 inch f/5 and CG5-AST mount from Inyokern, CA. Only 20 minutes of image capture time. The bright star located at 4 o'clock from the cluster is UW Can Maj, an eclipsing contact binary variable star. In fact, it is believed to be part of the cluster but there are contradictory indications as to it's distance. The components are both blue supergiants of a rare type. One is 16 times more massive than is our Sun, while the other is 13 times more massive. Oddly enough the more massive component is 1/3 the brightness of the lighter one but both are much, much brighter than our sun: 63,000 and 200,000 times so! These two massive stars are really tearing around one-another: Their period is about 4.5 days. The cluster itself, believe it or not, was discovered in around 1650 by Father Giovanni Batista Hodierna. He observed from SE Sicily with a 20 X singlet lens (ala Galileo) refractor and discovered several comets. He also created, nearly 100 years before Charles Messier, the earliest known list (some 40 objects) of telescopic nebulous objects to be ignored by comet hunters.
n2362-300secX4_median_log_cropped_psped
Taken in 2009-10 with the Starshooter Pro V1 single shot color cooled CCD camera shortly after receiving it. Used the 6 inch f/5 and CG5-AST mount from Inyokern, CA. Only 20 minutes of image capture time. The bright star located at 4 o'clock from the cluster is UW Can Maj, an eclipsing contact binary variable star. In fact, it is believed to be part of the cluster but there are contradictory indications as to it's distance. The components are both blue supergiants of a rare type. One is 16 times more massive than is our Sun, while the other is 13 times more massive. Oddly enough the more massive component is 1/3 the brightness of the lighter one but both are much, much brighter than our sun: 63,000 and 200,000 times so! These two massive stars are really tearing around one-another: Their period is about 4.5 days. The cluster itself, believe it or not, was discovered in around 1650 by Father Giovanni Batista Hodierna. He observed from SE Sicily with a 20 X singlet lens (ala Galileo) refractor and discovered several comets. He also created, nearly 100 years before Charles Messier, the earliest known list (some 40 objects) of telescopic nebulous objects to be ignored by comet hunters.