Dave Gary
Crab Nebula, M1
This is the Crab Nebula, M1. This represents an unguided 10-minute image. This about the limit possible, unguided, for my little 81mm telescope. The nebula was not visible with the eyepiece I had in the flip-mirror apparatus I use in my setup. I tried to use Astro Tortilla to plate-solve to pinpoint the location, but I couldn't get the program to solve for the data I had given it. Luckily, the mount was pretty much spot-on with this go-to. On a 10-second frame-and-focus I could see a faint smudge in the center of the field. I did a 2-minute exposure and, sure enough, there it was. Not much detail, but at least I can say I've seen the Crab Nebula with my own equipment.
That you can see this nebula is pretty amazing. This nebula is the remnant of a star that went supernova in 1054 AD. The Chinese recorded it, so did the Native Americans in the desert Southwest. A neutron star, approximately 20 km in diameter, is powering the nebula's emission via synchrotron radiation (free electrons accelerated by the neutron star's incredibly strong magnetic field). This neutron star has a rotational period of about 30 times per second. Here is a recording (in the radio spectrum) documenting the rotation rate of this neutron star:
www.parkes.atnf.csiro.au/people/sar049/eternal_life/super...
The Crab Pulsar, PSR B0531+21 (PSR=Pulsating Source of Radio) is composed almost entirely of neutrons with a density slightly higher than that found in an atomic nucleus. Basically, it's a huge, incredibly dense (the neutrons are nearly touching one another) nucleus composed of 10^57 neutrons held together by gravity instead of the strong nuclear force. To get an idea of this stellar remnant’s density, imagine all the people on this planet stuffed into a cube 1.5 centimeters on a side. Or another example, a modern-day aircraft carrier shrunk down to the size of the little ball in the end of a ball-point pen.
The force of gravity on this stellar remnant is incredible. Earth's gravitational acceleration is 9.8 meters per second squared. A mass dropped from 1 meter on Earth’s surface reaches a velocity, upon reaching the ground, of about 5 miles/hour. That same mass, dropped from a height of 1 meter on the surface of the Crab Nebula’s neutron star, would reach a velocity, upon hitting the surface, of about 2.1 million miles/hour. This neutron star’s gravitational acceleration is 1.86x10^12 meters/sec^2 or about 190 billion times Earth’s gravitational acceleration. And you thought you weighed a lot on Earth.
Crab Nebula, M1
This is the Crab Nebula, M1. This represents an unguided 10-minute image. This about the limit possible, unguided, for my little 81mm telescope. The nebula was not visible with the eyepiece I had in the flip-mirror apparatus I use in my setup. I tried to use Astro Tortilla to plate-solve to pinpoint the location, but I couldn't get the program to solve for the data I had given it. Luckily, the mount was pretty much spot-on with this go-to. On a 10-second frame-and-focus I could see a faint smudge in the center of the field. I did a 2-minute exposure and, sure enough, there it was. Not much detail, but at least I can say I've seen the Crab Nebula with my own equipment.
That you can see this nebula is pretty amazing. This nebula is the remnant of a star that went supernova in 1054 AD. The Chinese recorded it, so did the Native Americans in the desert Southwest. A neutron star, approximately 20 km in diameter, is powering the nebula's emission via synchrotron radiation (free electrons accelerated by the neutron star's incredibly strong magnetic field). This neutron star has a rotational period of about 30 times per second. Here is a recording (in the radio spectrum) documenting the rotation rate of this neutron star:
www.parkes.atnf.csiro.au/people/sar049/eternal_life/super...
The Crab Pulsar, PSR B0531+21 (PSR=Pulsating Source of Radio) is composed almost entirely of neutrons with a density slightly higher than that found in an atomic nucleus. Basically, it's a huge, incredibly dense (the neutrons are nearly touching one another) nucleus composed of 10^57 neutrons held together by gravity instead of the strong nuclear force. To get an idea of this stellar remnant’s density, imagine all the people on this planet stuffed into a cube 1.5 centimeters on a side. Or another example, a modern-day aircraft carrier shrunk down to the size of the little ball in the end of a ball-point pen.
The force of gravity on this stellar remnant is incredible. Earth's gravitational acceleration is 9.8 meters per second squared. A mass dropped from 1 meter on Earth’s surface reaches a velocity, upon reaching the ground, of about 5 miles/hour. That same mass, dropped from a height of 1 meter on the surface of the Crab Nebula’s neutron star, would reach a velocity, upon hitting the surface, of about 2.1 million miles/hour. This neutron star’s gravitational acceleration is 1.86x10^12 meters/sec^2 or about 190 billion times Earth’s gravitational acceleration. And you thought you weighed a lot on Earth.