Tour

Galaxies

Makarian’s Chain

Makarian's Chain
Makarian’s Chain

Makarian’s Chain is a collection of galaxies in the Virgo Cluster between 50 and 55 million light years away. It contains the larger galaxies M84 and M86 right in the center and to the left. On top to the right you see M87, the large elliptical galaxy with a large black hole in its center, which has been imaged in 2018 (published in 2019) as the first one of its kind using a worldwide network of radio telescopes.

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Globular Clusters

M 13

M 13
M 13

M 13 in Hercules. One of the brightest Globular Clusters in the Northern Hemisphere. It is about 22000 light years from earth and contains several hundred thousand stars. Globular clusters are remnants from times where galaxies formed. Since there is not much gas left in these clusters, most stars are pretty old and young stars are rare.

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Dark Nebulae

Rho Ophiuchi cloud complex

Rho Ophiuchi
Rho Ophiuchi

This is a relatively close star forming region (about 460 lightyears) in constellation Ophiuchus. Also visible below the nebulae Globular Cluster M4 at about 7200 light years distance and bright super giant star Antares in Scorpius just left to M4. On top the so called Blue Horsehead Nebula. Stripes of dark clouds at the left pointing to the core of our Milky Way.

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Emission Nebulae

M 42 (Orion Nebula)

M 42
M 42

This is the brightest part of the huge nebula complex in Orion. It is a star nursery and young stars illuminate remaining gas and dust in that region which is pretty close to our solar system: only about 1350 light years away.

This image was taken from my location above the city lights of Winterthur without any filter. And it was the first picture I gave a try with PixInsight … and the result was amazing. Stars were so bright that I reduced the exposure time down to 60 seconds in order to avoid pixel saturation.

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