View allAll Photos Tagged Globularcluster
Picture an unguided image of the globular star cluster M92 in Hercules taken with a ZWOASI183MC camera through a 130mm f/5 reflecting telescope and processed using DeepSkyStacker and Lightroom.
A misty moonlit night was a poor time to try RGB, imaging but without any nebulae in my part of the sky at that time i decided to give it a shot, i chose a star cluster for 2 reasons - bright enough to show up in short exposures, and wouldn't require much stretching during post-processing.
Simple RG and B (no luminance) 2min x 10 subs per filter. with darks.
M107 (NGC 6171) is another globular cluster in Ophiuchus, a bit south of the star Saik.
Shot with LRGB filters from my backyard in Long Beach, CA.
L: 20 20 s exposures
R: 15 60 s exposures
G: 15 60 s exposures
B: 17 60 s exposures
All taken with an Atik 414-EX mono camera on a Celestron Edge HD 925 at a focal length of 1530 mm. LRGB filters are from Optolong.
Pre-processing in Nebulosity; registration, stacking, channel combination, and processing in PixInsight; final touches in Photoshop.
Nella quiete del cielo estivo, M13 risplende come un gioiello incastonato nell'oscurità: una sfera perfetta di stelle, raccolte da una gravità antica e potente. Ogni punto luminoso è una stella che brilla da miliardi di anni — alcune più vecchie del Sole stesso — testimoni silenziosi della giovinezza dell’universo. La simmetria quasi ipnotica dell’ammasso racconta un equilibrio dinamico, mantenuto per ere cosmiche: un'armonia sferica di 300 mila stelle che resiste al caos galattico. Fotografare M13 è come aprire una finestra sull’eternità, osservando una cattedrale di luce che pulsa da oltre 11 miliardi di anni, sospesa a circa 22.000 anni luce da noi.
Telescopio Skywatcher 200/1000, 30 minuti di posa
#M13 #AmmassoGlobulare #GlobularCluster #Astronomia #Astrophotography #CieloProfondo #DeepSky #Telescopio #StelleAntiche #AncientStars #UniverseBeauty #BellezzaCosmica #NightSkyPhotography #AstrofotografiaItaliana #StarCluster #HerculesCluster #PassioneAstronomia #Astrophoto #SymmetryInNature #SpazioProfondo
Here is a view of the globular cluster NGC 6934 in the constellation Delphinus. It is about 54,000 light years away from Earth.
Observation data (J2000 epoch)
Class: VIII
Constellation: Delphinus
Right ascension: 20h 34m 11.37s
Declination: +07° 24′ 16.1″
Distance: 52 kly (16 kpc)
Apparent magnitude (V): 8.83
Tech Specs: Sky Watcher Esprit 120ED, ZWO ASI071mc-Pro running at 0C, Celestron CGEM-DX Mount Pier Mounted, ZWO EAF, ZWO AAP, 75 x 60 second exposures with dark/flat frames, guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and Orion 60mm guide scope. Image date: June 5, 2021. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA (Bortle 4 Zone).
NGC 5466 is a globular cluster that exhibits a low surface brightness and a less dense core compared to other globular clusters. Burnham lists this cluster at a magnitude of 9.0 and gives it a Class XII (in the Shapley–Sawyer Concentration Class, this is the lowest concentrated center of globular clusters).
Observation data (J2000 epoch)
Class: XII
Constellation: Boötes
Right ascension: 14h 05m 27.29s
Declination: +28° 32′ 04.0″
Distance: 51.9 kly
Apparent magnitude (V): 10.5
Apparent dimensions (V): 11’
Tech Specs: Sky-Watcher Esprit 120ED Telescope, ZWO AS2600mc-Pro running at -10C, Celestron CGEM-DX mount, 85 x 60 second guided exposures, darks from the library and flats at the end of imaging, focused with a ZWO EAF, controlled with a ZWO ASIAir Pro. Processed using PixInsight and DSS. Image Date: February 15, 2023. Location: The Dark Side Observatory (W59), Weatherly, PA, USA (Bortle Class 4).
A stereo pair of Comet C/2021 A1 (Leonard) as it moves through the sky. Early this morning (3 December) it passed in front of the nice globular cluster M3. From suburban Bloomington, Indiana, with no Moonlight but plenty of light pollution.
75 frames, each 90 sec. (nearly 2 hours total exposure), processed in Astro Pixel Processor, once to register on the comet, again to register on the stars, processed in Lightroom and composited in Photoshop.
Explore Scientific 102mm f/7 refractor, ZWO ASI294MC camera, UV/IR cut fillter, iOptron CEM25P mount, ASIAir Pro controller.
Globular Cluster Messier 80 (M80 or NGC 6093) is a globular cluster that can be found in the constellation Scorpius. M80 lies at a distance of about 32,600 light-years and is one of the densest globular clusters in our galaxy.
Tech Specs: Sky-Watcher Esprit 120mm ED Triplet APO Refractor, Canon 6D stock camera, ISO 3200, 10 x 60 second exposures with dark/bias frames, guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and Orion 60mm guide scope. Image date: June 23, 2019. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA.
M71 is about 12,000 light years away from Earth and is about 27 light years across. Up until the 1970’s this cluster was designated as a densely packed open cluster because of the loose central region, today it is designated as a loosely concentrated globular cluster with a young age of 9-10 billion years.
Tech Specs: Meade 12” LX-90, ZWO ASI071mc-Pro, 29 x 60 second exposures, guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and Orion 60mm guide scope. Captured using Sequence Generator Pro and processed using PixInsight. Image date: May 25, 2020. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA.
Messier 14 (M14 or NGC 6402) is a globular cluster in a rather empty area of the constellation Ophiuchus. It was discovered in 1764 by the French astronomer Charles Messier who described it as a “nebula without stars, not large, faint, and round”. M14 is approximately 29,000 light-years distant. You will definitely need binoculars or a small telescope to see this cluster.
Observation data (J2000 epoch)
Class: VIII
Constellation: Ophiuchus
Right ascension: 17h 37m 36.15s
Declination: –03° 14′ 45.3″
Distance: 30.3 kly
Apparent magnitude (V): 7.6
Apparent dimensions (V): 11.0′
Tech Specs: Sky-Watcher Esprit 120ED Telescope, ZWO ASI2600MC camera running at 0F, 81x60 seconds guided exposures, Sky-Watcher EQ6R-Pro pier mounted, ZWO EAF and ASIAir Pro, processed in DSS and PixInsight. Image Date: May 18, 2023. Location: The Dark Side Observatory (W59), Weatherly, PA, USA (Bortle Class 4).
Messier 13, also referred to as the Great Globular Cluster in Hercules, is one of the brightest and best known globular clusters in the northern skies. It shines at a magnitude of 5.8, is about 22,200 light years away and contains an estimated 300,000 stars.
Tech Specs: Meade 12” LX-90, ZWO ASI071mc-Pro, 27 x 60 second exposures, guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and Orion 60mm guide scope. Captured using Sequence Generator Pro and processed using PixInsight. Image date: March 22, 2020. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA.
Comet C/2021 A1 (Leonard)
Messier 3 / M3 / NGC 5272
Comet Leonard appeared to pass between the Whale Galaxy (NGC4631) and the Crowbar Galaxy (NGC4656) in late November. It then passed within a few arcminutes of Messier 3 on December 3rd, creating this spectacular conjunction. These objects may seem close, but they are extremely far apart: the light from the comet took about 3.5 minutes to reach Earth, while the light from the cluster has been traveling through space for 34,000 years.
Comet Leonard was predicted to become the brightest comet of 2021 around mid-December. It just barely achieved naked-eye visibility for northern observers before it was lost in the morning twilight. The comet will reach perihelion on January 3, 2022, marking the end of its 40,000-year journey to the inner Solar System. It will then be ejected into interstellar space, never to return.
Apparent magnitude: 6.2 (estimate from Stellarium)
Distance from Earth: 0.438 AU
Orbital period: 8,000 years (before ejection)
Velocity (relative to Sun): 28 mile/s (45 km/s)
Comet/starfield total integration: 1 hour 19 minutes
158 x 30 seconds ISO1600 [Bortle 6 in SC]
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M3 total integration: 8 hours 48 minutes
446 x 60 seconds ISO800 [Bortle 6 in VA]
41 x 120 seconds ISO200 [Bortle 8/9 in FL]
Stacked separately for comet and stars, with extra M3 detail blended in from a previous image: flic.kr/p/2kdWmeC
Summary of processing details here: www.cloudynights.com/topic/803224-comet-leonard-and-messi...
Location: Summerville, SC (comet and stars), Charlottesville, VA and Coral Springs, FL (M3 core)
SQM: 18.99 mag/arcsec^2, 19.32 mag/arcsec^2, 18.20 mag/arcsec^2 (Bortle 6, 6, and 8/9 respectively)
Camera: Canon T3i (stock/unmodified)
Average camera temperature: 90 F (32 C)
Telescope: Explore Scientific ED80 f/6.0 Apochromatic Refractor (with ES field flattener)
Mount: Orion Sirius EQ-G
Guide scope: Svbony 50mm f/4.0 Guide Scope
Guide camera: Orion StarShoot AutoGuider
Capture software: N.I.N.A., PlateSolve2, PHD2
Processing software: PixInsight, Paint.NET
Messier 3 (also known as M3 or NGC 5272) is a globular cluster found in the northern constellation of Canes Venatici. M3 is one of the three brightest globular clusters in the Northern hemisphere (along with M13 and M5). This cluster is made up of around 500,000 stars. It is estimated to be 11.4 billion years old. It is located at a distance of about 33,900 light-years away from Earth.
Observation data (J2000 epoch)
Class: VI
Constellation: Canes Venatici
Right ascension: 13h 42m 11.62s
Declination: +28° 22′ 38.2″
Distance: 33.9 kly
Apparent magnitude (V): 6.39
Apparent dimensions (V): 18′.0
Tech Specs: Sky-Watcher Esprit 120ED Telescope, ZWO AS2600mc-Pro running at -10C, Celestron CGEM-DX mount, 90 x 60 second guided exposures, darks from the library and flats at the end of imaging, focused with a ZWO EAF, controlled with a ZWO ASIAir Pro. Processed using PixInsight and DSS. Image Date: February 15, 2023. Location: The Dark Side Observatory (W59), Weatherly, PA, USA (Bortle Class 4).
Messier (M2) is the first globular cluster listed in the Messier catalog and is located about 37,000 light years away from Earth. M2 is located in the constellation Aquarius and is one of the largest globular clusters. It has an estimated diameter of 150 light years and contains over 150,000 stars bound together by their mutual gravitational attraction.
Tech Specs: Meade 12” LX-90, ZWO ASI071mc-Pro, 21 x 60 second exposures, guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and Orion 60mm guide scope. Captured using Sequence Generator Pro and processed using PixInsight. Image date: September 9, 2020. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA.
Here is Palomar 8 from the catalog of 15 Palomar Globular Clusters. Palomar 8 is found in the constellation Sagittarius, has a magnitude of 11.0 and a diameter of 5.2'.
Tech Specs: Sky-Watcher Esprit 120mm ED Triplet APO Refractor, Celestron CGEM-DX mount, Canon 6D stock camera, ISO 3200, 13 x 60 second exposures with dark/bias frames, guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and Orion 60mm guide scope. Image date: October 1, 2018. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA.
Messier 12 (M12 or NGC 6218 in the New General Catalog) is a globular cluster in the constellation Ophiuchus. It is also referred to as the “Gumball Globular”. It was discovered in 1764 by the French astronomer Charles Messier who described it as a “nebula without stars”. M12 is approximately 15,700 light-years distant. You will definitely need binoculars or a small telescope to see this cluster. This cluster contains about 200,000 stars, the brightest of them are about 12th magnitude.
Observation data (J2000 epoch)
Class: IX
Constellation: Ophiuchus
Right ascension: 16h 47m 14.18s
Declination: –01° 56′ 54.7″
Distance: 16.44 ± 0.16 kly
Apparent magnitude (V): 6.7
Apparent dimensions (V): 16′.0
Tech Specs: Sky-Watcher Esprit 120ED Telescope, ZWO ASI2600MC camera running at 0F, 90x60 seconds guided exposures, Sky-Watcher EQ6R-Pro pier mounted, ZWO EAF and ASIAir Pro, processed in DSS and PixInsight. Image Date: May 11, 2023. Location: The Dark Side Observatory (W59), Weatherly, PA, USA (Bortle Class 4).
Messier 13, also referred to as the Great Globular Cluster in Hercules, is one of the brightest and best known globular clusters in the northern skies. It shines at a magnitude of 5.8, is about 22,200 light years away and contains an estimated 300,000 stars.
Tech Specs: Meade 12” LX-90, Celestron CGEM-DX pier mounted, ZWO ASI071mc-Pro, Antares Focal Reducer, 98 x 60 second at -10C, 30 darks and 30 flats, guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and Orion 60mm guide scope. Captured using Sequence Generator Pro and processed using PixInsight. Image date: April 5, 2021. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA (Bortle Class 4).
Imaged waiting for the Pleiades to get high enough above the horizon (previous images).
77 x 1 minute exposures
Technical details essentially the same as the Pleiades images.
When observed with the unaided eye, Omega Centauri, the object in this image, appears as a fuzzy, faint star. But the blue orb we see here is, in fact, a collection of stars – 10 million of them. You cannot count them all, but in this sharp, beautiful image you can see a few of the numerous pinpoints of bright light that make up this unique cluster.
The image was taken by Wouter van Reeven, a software engineer at ESA's European Space Astronomy Centre near Madrid, Spain, during his recent visit to Chile to observe the July total solar eclipse. From his home base in Spain the cluster only grazes the horizon, making it near-impossible to image, but from the La Silla Observatory in Chile it was high in the sky, presenting the ideal opportunity to photograph it.
Omega Centauri is a picture-perfect example of a globular cluster: tightly bound by gravity, it has a very high density of stars at its centre and a nearly perfect spherical shape (the name ‘globular cluster’ comes from the latin word for small sphere, globulus). It lives in the halo of the Milky Way, at a distance of about 15 800 light years from Earth.
As other globular clusters, Omega Centauri is made up of very old stars and it is almost devoid of gas and dust, indicating star formation in the cluster has long ceased. Its stars have a low proportion of elements heavier than hydrogen and helium, signaling they were formed earlier in the history of the Universe than stars like our Sun. Unlike in many other globular clusters, however, the stars in Omega Centauri don’t all have the same age and chemical abundances, making astronomers puzzle over the formation and evolution of this cluster. Some scientists have even suggested that Omega Centauri may not be a true cluster at all, but rather the leftovers of a dwarf galaxy that collided with the Milky Way.
Omega Centauri is also special in many other ways, not least because of the sheer number of stars it contains. It is the largest globular cluster in our galaxy, at about 150 light years in diameter, and is also the brightest and most massive of its type, its stars having a combined mass of about four million solar masses.
Omega Centauri can be seen with the naked eye under dark skies and imaging it doesn’t require long exposure times. To create the composition we see here, Wouter combined eight images taken with an exposure time of 10 seconds, seven images of 30 seconds each and another seven images of 60 seconds each. He used a SkyWatcher Esprit 80 ED telescope and a Canon EOS 200D camera.
Credits: ESA/CESAR/Wouter van Reeven, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
Messier 10 (or M10) is a globular cluster in the constellation Ophiuchus. It is approximately 15,000 light years away. From Wikipedia, “A globular cluster is a spherical collection of stars that orbits a galactic core as a satellite. Globular clusters are very tightly bound by gravity, which gives them their spherical shapes and relatively high stellar densities toward their centers.”
Tech Specs: Sky-Watcher Esprit 120mm ED Triplet APO Refractor, Canon 6D, ISO 3200, 10 x 60 second exposures with dark/bias frames, guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and Orion 60mm guide scope. Image date: June 22, 2019. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA.
Single frame taken with a Canon 50mm F/1.8 - 10sec exp ISO3200. This lens only cost me $90 on ebay, what a bargain! No wonder many refer to this lens as their 'Nifty Fifty'.
Levels stretched in RAW and Photoshop.
Comet Garradd passing by globular cluster Messier 15. Taken on 3. august 2011. this was an image I never had the skills to process. So my friend Neven Krčmarek had a go, and the result is fantastic! Finally, after almost exaclty 12 years the reult is here!
Taken with Pentax 105 apo refractor on Celestron CGE mount and SBIG STL-11000M camera. Single LRGB exposures were 2 minutes, for 68 minute total. Amazing work, I suggest you contact Neven if you need really professional processing of your images!
The Globular Cluster M10 resides at the center of the constellation Ophiuchus (the Serpent Holder). This large constellation takes up a large section of the summer night sky. Ophiuchus is well endowed with globular clusters with well over a dozen within reach of my 155mm refractor from the light-polluted skies above my observing deck at the house. M10 is my favorite Ophiuchus globular.
Additional Astronomy drawings can be seen at: www.orrastrodrawing.com
This image, from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope’s Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS), reveals thousands of globular clusters lying at the core of a galaxy cluster. It was created by a Hubble survey that drew on data from three of the telescope’s separate observing programmes to explore the centre of the Coma cluster, a huge gathering of over 1000 galaxies, about 320 million light-years away, all bound together by gravity.
Astronomers spotted over 22 000 globular clusters, some of which had formed a bridge connecting a pair of well-known interacting galaxies (NGC 4889 and NGC 4874). A globular cluster is a spherical group of stars that usually orbits a galaxy as a self-contained satellite. However, the globular clusters studied here are of a different type, intracluster globular clusters. Specifically, these are globular clusters that are not bound to an individual galaxy, but to a galaxy cluster — in this case, Coma.
While globular clusters orbiting our Milky Way reveal themselves as sparkling spherical assemblies of densely packed stars, at the distance of the Comla cluster, they only appear as tiny dots of light, even to Hubble's advanced vision. However, a characteristic feature of globular clusters is their colour; since the stars in any given cluster all formed at around the same time and from the same “stuff”, they usually have a consistent colour. In this way, the astronomers were able to identify the clusters — and rule out background galaxies lying in the same region of sky — by analysing their colour and size, painting a beautiful family portrait of Coma and its clusters.
With the help of the identified globular clusters astronomers can map the distribution of matter and — even more important — of dark matter in the Coma cluster. The Coma Cluster was one of the first places where observed gravitational anomalies indicated the existence of dark matter.
Credits: NASA, ESA, J. Mack, and J. Madrid et al., CC BY 4.0
Messier 3 (also known as M3 or NGC 5272) is a globular cluster found in the northern constellation of Canes Venatici. M3 is one of the three brightest globular clusters in the Northern hemisphere (along with M13 and M5). This cluster is made up of around 500,000 stars. It is estimated to be 11.4 billion years old. It is located at a distance of about 33,900 light-years away from Earth.
Observation data (J2000 epoch)
Class: VI
Constellation: Canes Venatici
Right ascension: 13h 42m 11.62s
Declination: +28° 22′ 38.2″
Distance: 33.9 kly
Apparent magnitude (V): 6.39
Apparent dimensions (V): 18′.0
Tech Specs: Meade 12” LX-90, Celestron CGEM-DX pier mounted, Antares Focal Reducer, ZWO ASI290MC and ASI071MC-Pro, ZWO AAPlus, ZWO EAF, 72 x 60 seconds at 0C plus darks and flats, processed using PixInsight and DSS. Image Date: May 30, 2022. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA (Bortle Class 4).
Here is an image I captured last night showing (from top to bottom) Saturn, Mars and Antares. Do you see the fuzzy ball to the lower right of Antares? That is a globular cluster known as the Cat’s Eye or Messier 4.
Tech Specs: Canon T4i, Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L USM lens, iOptron SkyTracker, ISO 800, 30 seconds, f/2.8, 73mm.
A Cosmic snowball of Stars.
Mixed weather forecasts tonight - decided I would chance it and assembled scope in back garden. Only got 15 minutes on target before hail shower! Scope quickly capped and disassembled!
Processed the 3 x 5 minute images of Globular cluster Messier 3 anyway. I used generic flats, darks and bias frames from my last session.
This is a mini-galaxy that orbits our own galaxy but it has lost any spiral arms it once possessed to our own galaxy's gravity, leaving just a spherical core of mostly old yellow stars. Sometimes, the stars interact in the dense core and one can steal matter off a neighbour to form a "blue straggler" which behaves like a young blue star.
Its estimated that there 500000 stars in this globular cluster including a large number of RR Lyrae variables that can act as a "standard candle" to measure interstellar distances as the luminosity of these stars varies in a periodic manner with time.
M3 lies about 33900 LY away from Earth.
Equinox ED 900mm f/7.5 scope x0.85 focal reducer.
Modified Canon 80D @ ISO400, 3 x 300 second subs.
SkyWatcher EQ6 pro mount with Rowan belt drive modification.
Guided by PHD2 via PrimaLuce 240mm f/4 guidescope.
Camera Temp: 8-9c
Astrometry:
Resolution: 0.978 arcsec/pxl
Focal distance: 791.17 mm
Pixel size: 3.75 um
Field of view: 56' 41.3" x 47' 40.6"
Image centre: RA: 13 42 11.692 Dec: +28 22 35
Polar Alignment:
QHY Polemaster alignment -
Error measured by PHD2= 0.5 arc minute.
RA drift + 0.98 arcsec/min
Dec drift - 0.12 arcsec/min
Guiding:
PHD2 guiding with ZWO ASI290mm/PrimaLuce Lab 240/60mm guide scope. Every 3rd shot dithered.
RA RMS error 0.67 arcsec.
Dec RMS error 0.48 arcsec.
Personal Notes:
One star had quite a halo but used masked Atrous wavelet method in PixInsight to good effect.
Messier 12 (M12 or NGC 6218 in the New General Catalog) is a globular cluster in the constellation Ophiuchus. It is also referred to as the “Gumball Globular”. It was discovered in 1764 by the French astronomer Charles Messier who described it as a “nebula without stars”. M12 is approximately 15,700 light-years distant. You will definitely need binoculars or a small telescope to see this cluster. This cluster contains about 200,000 stars, the brightest of them are about 12th magnitude.
Tech Specs: Meade 12” LX-90, ZWO ASI071mc-Pro, 20 x 60 second exposures, guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and Orion 60mm guide scope. Captured using Sequence Generator Pro and processed using PixInsight. Image date: May 25, 2020. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA.
NGC 5466 is a globular cluster that exhibits a low surface brightness and a less dense core compared to other globular clusters. Burnham lists this cluster at a magnitude of 9.0 and gives it a Class XII (in the Shapley–Sawyer Concentration Class, this is the lowest concentrated center of globular clusters).
Tech Specs: Meade 12” LX-90, Celestron CGEM-DX pier mounted, ZWO ASI071mc-Pro, Antares Focal Reducer, 107 x 60 second at -10C, 30 darks and 30 flats, guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and Orion 60mm guide scope. Captured using Sequence Generator Pro and processed using PixInsight. Image date: April 3, 2021. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA (Bortle Class 4).
NGC 6366 is a loose globular cluster found in the constellation Ophiuchus. It has a Shapley–Sawyer Concentration Class of XI, which gives it a real loose central core (XII having almost no central core).
Tech Specs: Sky-Watcher Esprit 120mm ED Triplet APO Refractor, Canon 6D, ISO 3200, 20 x 60 seconds (with darks and bias frames), guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and 60mm guide scope. Stacked with DSS and processed in ImagesPlus. Image date: 29 July 2019. Location: The Dark Side Observatory in Weatherly, PA, USA.
M15 è un ammasso globulare nella costellazione di Pegaso: il suo diametro apparente è di 18' (circa 1/3 del diametro apparente della Luna piena) e magnitudine 6.2 (può essere visto con un binocolo sotto un cielo scuro).
L'ammasso contiene molte stelle variabili, più di 1110, e questo ha permesso di stimare la sua distanza in 33600 anni luce dalla Terra.
Questo ammasso ha due caratteristiche: è uno dei più densi della Via Lattea e contiene al suo interno una nebulosa planetaria (Pease 1, scoperta nel 1927 su immagini prese all'Osservatorio di Monte Wilson, non visibile nella mia immagine).
Per cercare di contenere la saturazione del nucleo, ho combinato pose "lunghe" da 300" l'una con pose "corte" da 15" l'una.
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M15 is a globular cluster in the constellation of Pegasus; it has an apparent diameter of 18’ and magnitude 6.2.
The cluster contains many variable stars, as many as 110, which allowed us to estimate a distance of 33,600 light years.
This cluster has two peculiar characteristics: it is one of the densest in the Milky Way and contains a planetary nebula (Pease 1, discovered in 1927 on photos taken by the Mount Wilson Observatory).
Technical data
Image taken on 4/28/30 September and 7 December 2019 from Promiod (Aosta Valley, Italy)
RC12 GSO Truss (diameter 304mm, focal lenght 2432mm)
Mount GM2000 HPSII
CCD Moravian G3-16200 with filters Astrodon Tru-Balance Gen2 E-Serie
Exposures “long”: L 34x300", R 9x300”, G 12x300", B 10x300”, all in bin2 with sensor temperature -20C
Exposures “short”: L 15x15", R 15x15”, G 15x15", B 15x15”, all in bin2 with sensor temperature -30C
Total exposure 5.8h
Guide with OAG Moravian and Moravian camera G1-0301
The whole imaging session was managed by Voyager sw
Post processing with Pixinsight 1.8 e Photoshop
It has been about two years since I last imaged M92 in Hercules and I decided to try some short exposures using the Meade 12” now that it is mounted on the Celestron CGEM-DX mount.
M92 is a bright, compact globular cluster located in the northern section of Hercules. I think Robert Burnham said it best, “This is a beautiful rich globular cluster which in almost any other constellation would be considered a major show object; in Hercules it has been somewhat overshadowed by the splendor of the fabulous M13.” (Burnham’s Celestial Handbook – Volume 2 – Robert Burnham Jr.)
The image is composed of 20 x 15 second images at ISO 3200 with additional dark and bias frames. Tech Info: Meade LX90 12” telescope, Antares Focal Reducer, and Canon 6D camera. Imaging was done on July 27, 2016.
The Hercules Cluster is a large collection of stars called a globular cluster. Globular clusters are gravitationally bound densely packed groups of stars; it is estimated the Hercules Cluster contains ~300,000 stars. As the name suggests, it is found in the constellation Hercules and is easily visible with binoculars or a telescope. This cluster is ~25,000 lightyears away from Earth and ~145 lightyears across.
I love observing the Hercules Cluster through my telescope as it is one of the brightest globular clusters visible in the northern hemisphere. When I invite the public to view the night sky through my scope it is one of the objects we often look at.
Shot from my backyard near Taos, New Mexico.
Equipment:
SkyWatcher EQ6-R Mount
Nikon 800mm f/5.6 AI-S - shot at f/8
Nikon 1.4x Teleconverter
Sony a7RIII (unmodified)
ZWO 30mm Guide Scope
GPCAM2 Mono Camera
Acquisition:
Taos, NM: my backyard - Bortle 3
55 x 121" for 1 hour 50 min and 55 sec of exposure time.
8 dark frames
15 flats frames
15 bias frames
Software:
SharpCap
PHD2
PixInsight
Lightroom
Photoshop
My a7rIII and adapted Nikon 800mm f/5.6 AI-S lens were mounted to my SkyWatcher EQ6-R mount using a vixen rail. The guidescope/camera were fixed to the front of the rail. I used SharpCap to achieve "excellent" polar alignment. I shot ISO 1600, f/8 with a 1.4x teleconverter, making the focal length 1120mm. I took 121" exposures using PHD2 with my guidescope to keep tracking accurately. I brought the lights/darks/flats/bias frames into PixInsight for stacking and aligning and then used: STF, Cropping, Dynamic Background Extraction, BlurXTerminator, plate solving, color correction, NoiseXTerminator HDR, and then the background of the cluster was separated from the stars using StarXterminator, and both files processed and stretched separately and then recombined using PixelMath. That file was brought into Lightroom for Metadata and EXIF tags, light post-processing, and cropping. I used Photoshop to sharpen the final image.
Here is a very wide field view capturing both the Dumbbell Nebula (M27) and the globular cluster M71. M27 is the blue ball in the upper right corner and M71 is the tight ball of stars in the lower left corner.
Tech Specs: Williams Optics Redcat 51 APO, Celestron CGEM-DX mount, Canon 6D stock camera, ISO 3200, 5 x 60 second exposures with dark/bias frames, guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and Orion 60mm guide scope. Image date: September 25, 2019. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA.
Imaged on 30 October 2021 when the object was still relatively low and in the light pollution dome in part; the Optolong L Pro does a reasonable job but of course doesn’t compare to imaging from a dark site. Still at least not much moon to worry about
EQ6/ED 80/ L Pro/ ZWO ASI 183 MC
19 x30 secs + 30 x 60 secs + 30 x 120 seconds= 1 hour and 40 minutes of exposure
Software:
NINA/ PHD 2/ Astro Pixel Processor/ Photoshop CS6
Location: Bortle 6
Moon Phase: waning crescent 33 %
This sparkling burst of stars is Messier 75. It is a globular cluster: a spherical collection of stars bound together by gravity. Clusters like this orbit around galaxies and typically reside in their outer and less-crowded areas, gathering to form dense communities in the galactic suburbs.
Messier 75 lies in the constellation of Sagittarius (The Archer), around 67 000 light-years away from Earth. The majority of the cluster’s stars, about 400 000 in total, are found in its core; it is one of the most densely populated clusters ever found, with a phenomenal luminosity of some 180 000 times that of the Sun. No wonder it photographs so well!
Discovered in 1780 by Pierre Méchain, Messier 75 was also observed by Charles Messier and added to his catalogue later that year. This image of Messier 75 was captured by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope’s Advanced Camera for Surveys.
Credits: ESA/Hubble & NASA, F. Ferraro et al.; CC BY 4.0
M92 was first discovered by the German astronomer Johann Elert Bode in 1777 and it's approximately 27,000 light years away in the constellation Hercules. It has an apparent 6.3 magnitude and contains roughly 330,000 stars!!
This was an opportunistic target. I've been imaging a different target for the last couple of nights, and when that one disappears I still have under 2 hours left of darkness. I decided to use that "extra" time to image M92 as it only needs 30s to 1 minute subs. The two days of spare change added up to a total of 3.5 hours integration with around 250 subs.
I used my William Optics FLT132 with Flattener 68III (1.0x). Antlia Triband RGB Ultra filter and ZWO ASI2600MC Pro camera on a ZWO AM5 mount.
Pre and post processed with PixInsight and Affinity Photo 2.
For more information, visit AstroBin:
Thanks for looking.
Clear Skies.
Eduardo
M92 is a bright, compact globular cluster located in the northern section of Hercules. I think Robert Burnham said it best, “This is a beautiful rich globular cluster which in almost any other constellation would be considered a major show object; in Hercules it has been somewhat overshadowed by the splendor of the fabulous M13.” (Burnham’s Celestial Handbook – Volume 2 – Robert Burnham Jr.)
Tech Specs: Meade 12” LX-90, ZWO ASI071mc-Pro, 19 x 60 second exposures, guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and Orion 60mm guide scope. Captured using Sequence Generator Pro and processed using PixInsight. Image date: April 19, 2020. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA.
Just over thirty minutes of 1min exposures at ISO800. 20 mins of darks, no flats. Stacked in DSS. Edited in Nebulosity and Lightroom.
M: iOptron EQ45-Pro
T: William Optics GTF81
C: ZWO ASI1600MC-Cooled
F: No Filter
G: PHD2
GC: ZWO ASI120mini [OAG]
RAW16; FITs
Temp: -15 DegC
Gain 200;
25 x Exp 15s
Frames: 25 Lights; 50 Darks; 50 Flats
60% Crop
Capture: SharpCap
Processed: APP; PS
Sky: No moon, calm, 30%cloud, mild, good seeing.
NGC 5466 is a globular cluster that exhibits a low surface brightness and a less dense core compared to other globulars. Burnham lists this cluster at a magnitude of 9.0 and gives it a Class XII (in the Shapley–Sawyer Concentration Class, this is the lowest concentrated center of the globulars).
•Class: XII
•Constellation: Boötes
•Right ascension: 14h 05m 27.29s
•Declination: +28° 32′ 04.0″
•Distance: 51,900 ly
•Apparent magnitude (V): 10.5
•Estimated age: 13.57 billion years
Imaging Specs: Meade 12" LX90, Canon 6D, 27 x 60 seconds at ISO 3200 (includes darks, bias and flats), guided, stacked with DSS, processed with ImagesPlus. Image Date: April 22, 2019. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA.
Messier 13, also referred to as the Great Globular Cluster in Hercules, is one of the brightest and best known globular clusters in the northern skies. It shines at a magnitude of 5.8, is about 22,200 light years away and contains an estimated 300,000 stars.
Tech Specs: Sky-Watcher Esprit 120mm ED Triplet APO Refractor, Canon 6D stock camera, ISO 3200, 10 x 60 second with dark/bias frames, guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and Orion 60mm guide scope. Image date: 31 May 2019. Location: The Dark Side Observatory in Weatherly, PA.
M 15 is about 33,600 light-years from Earth, and 175 light-years in diameter. Messier 15 is one of the most densely packed globulars known in the Milky Way galaxy. Its core has undergone a contraction known as "core collapse" and it has a central density cusp with an enormous number of stars (100,000)! surrounding what may be a central black hole.
this is LRGB 4.25 hours total integration.
OTA: Esprit 120mm 840 focal length f 7.0
Camera: QHY268C
Gain: 26
Filters: Optolong LRGB
Cooling Temperature: -10 Celsius
Mount: SkyWatcher EQ6-R with QHY Polemaster alignment
Autofocus: Sesto Senso 2
Guide scope: Orion 60mm focal length 240mm f/4
Auto-guiding: ZWO ASI290MM Mini
Control: Primaluce Eagle 4S
Calibrated PixInsight
Processed in Pixinsight and Lightroom
Phoenix, AZ - Bortle 9 skies
Could dying stars hold the secret to looking younger? New evidence from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope suggests that white dwarfs could continue to burn hydrogen in the final stages of their lives, causing them to appear more youthful than they actually are. This discovery could have consequences for how astronomers measure the ages of star clusters.
The prevalent view of white dwarfs as inert, slowly cooling stars has been challenged by observations from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. An international group of astronomers have discovered the first evidence that white dwarfs can slow down their rate of ageing by burning hydrogen on their surface.
“We have found the first observational evidence that white dwarfs can still undergo stable thermonuclear activity,” explained Jianxing Chen of the Alma Mater Studiorum Università di Bologna and the Italian National Institute for Astrophysics, who led this research. “This was quite a surprise, as it is at odds with what is commonly believed.”
White dwarfs are the slowly cooling stars which have cast off their outer layers during the last stages of their lives. They are common objects in the cosmos; roughly 98% of all the stars in the Universe will ultimately end up as white dwarfs, including our own Sun. Studying these cooling stages helps astronomers understand not only white dwarfs, but also their earlier stages as well.
To investigate the physics underpinning white dwarf evolution, astronomers compared cooling white dwarfs in two massive collections of stars: the globular clusters M3 and M13. These two clusters share many physical properties such as age and metallicity but the populations of stars which will eventually give rise to white dwarfs are different. In particular, the overall colour of stars at an evolutionary stage known as the Horizontal Branch are bluer in M13, indicating a population of hotter stars. This makes M3 and M13 together a perfect natural laboratory in which to test how different populations of white dwarfs cool.
“The superb quality of our Hubble observations provided us with a full view of the stellar populations of the two globular clusters,” continued Chen. “This allowed us to really contrast how stars evolve in M3 and M13.”
Using Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 the team observed M3 and M13 at near-ultraviolet wavelengths, allowing them to compare more than 700 white dwarfs in the two clusters. They found that M3 contains standard white dwarfs which are simply cooling stellar cores. M13, on the other hand, contains two populations of white dwarfs: standard white dwarfs and those which have managed to hold on to an outer envelope of hydrogen, allowing them to burn for longer and hence cool more slowly.
Comparing their results with computer simulations of stellar evolution in M13, the researchers were able to show that roughly 70% of the white dwarfs in M13 are burning hydrogen on their surfaces, slowing down the rate at which they are cooling.
This discovery could have consequences for how astronomers measure the ages of stars in the Milky Way. The evolution of white dwarfs has previously been modelled as a predictable cooling process. This relatively straightforward relationship between age and temperature has led astronomers to use the white dwarf cooling rate as a natural clock to determine the ages of star clusters, particularly globular and open clusters. However, white dwarfs burning hydrogen could cause these age estimates to be inaccurate by as much as 1 billion years.
Credits: ESA/Hubble & NASA, G. Piotto et al.; CC BY 4.0
Comet Lovejoy (C/2104 Q2) on the night of Dec. 27/28, 2014, as it was approaching the globular cluster M79 at upper right, in Lepus. The comet was naked eye, though only if you knew just where to look. But in binoculars it was an obvious fuzzball with the tail just barely visible extending to the north as in the photo, though just near the comet.
This is a stack of 5 x 3 minute exposures at ISO 2500 with the Canon 5D MkII and TMB 92mm refractor at f/4.4. Taken from near Silver City, New Mexico.