47 Tucanae (NGC 104)
47 Tucanae is a globular cluster in the Tucana constellation, around 1100 light years from earth.
As is common for globular clusters, this one is much brighter in its core compared to the rest of it; so I had to use various exposure lengths to keep a bit of detail in every part of the frame. I like the core to be brighter than the rest of the cluster, while still showing some detail.
For those of you curious, the reason the above happens is because of a process called mass segregation. Very simply put, as individual stars within the cluster get close (astronomically speaking) to one another; they interact in such a way that in most cases the more massive of the bunch will slow down while the less massive stars will get a speed bump. Over long periods of time, this causes the more massive stars to "sink" down to a lower orbit around the cluster's center, while the less massive ones go into higher orbits. A lot of massive stars in a relatively small section of space (again, astronomically speaking) of course equals of lot of brightness when viewing it from a distance.
Image acquisition details:
6x600" Red
6x600" Green
6x600" Blue
3x60" Red
3x60" Green
3x60" Blue
3x30" Red
3x30" Green
3x30" Blue
47 Tucanae (NGC 104)
47 Tucanae is a globular cluster in the Tucana constellation, around 1100 light years from earth.
As is common for globular clusters, this one is much brighter in its core compared to the rest of it; so I had to use various exposure lengths to keep a bit of detail in every part of the frame. I like the core to be brighter than the rest of the cluster, while still showing some detail.
For those of you curious, the reason the above happens is because of a process called mass segregation. Very simply put, as individual stars within the cluster get close (astronomically speaking) to one another; they interact in such a way that in most cases the more massive of the bunch will slow down while the less massive stars will get a speed bump. Over long periods of time, this causes the more massive stars to "sink" down to a lower orbit around the cluster's center, while the less massive ones go into higher orbits. A lot of massive stars in a relatively small section of space (again, astronomically speaking) of course equals of lot of brightness when viewing it from a distance.
Image acquisition details:
6x600" Red
6x600" Green
6x600" Blue
3x60" Red
3x60" Green
3x60" Blue
3x30" Red
3x30" Green
3x30" Blue