Imaging the Rosette Nebula - Part 2

Last evening the sky cleared just enough to get some additional subs of the Rosette Nebula.  This was crucial for my attempt at getting a nice final image of the Rosette in that the nebula is getting lower and lower in the western sky, hitting my tree-line before 11:30pm. And with daylight savings time coming up, the moon re-entering the scene and cloudy nights projected for the next 6 nights (although one model has clear skies for Friday) I needed to get as many subs as I could or wait 'till next year.

I had to set up the scope rather late in the evening, around 9:00pm and get everything up and running before 10:00 or so with any hope of imaging 20 subs before the nebula dropped too low. This didn't leave enough time for the OTA to cool-down to ambient temperature, but I couldn't wait the normal 60 - 90 minutes. Everything worked almost perfectly and I was ready by 10:20. Since I had the previous image of the nebula saved out on Astrobin all I needed to do was link to that image and SGP would automatically center the nebula exactly where it was on Feb 29th. SGP's plate-solve and auto-center worked like a charm - I started the imaging run at 10:30.

By 11:10pm the auto-guider started to 'beep' me (losing guide star lock) , and I figured either the nebula was in the trees or the clouds moved in. Turns out both were true. So the imaging run was aborted with 14 of the planned 20 completed.

Adding the new subs to the old ones and re-processing the set I was able to get a nice clean, less noisy image. Although not completely done with this object the lateness of the season means any further imaging will need to wait until next winter. It's time to seek out other DSOs.

Enjoy.

NGC 2238 - Rosette Nebula
EdgeHD11 - 24x180sec QHY10 Camera
March 9, 2016

Imaging the Rosette Nebula - Part 1

NGC 2238, commonly known as the Rosette Nebula, is a beautiful circular emission nebula just east of the star Betelgeuse (left shoulder of Orion the hunter), in the constellation Monoceros.  It surrounds a cluster of bright stars known as the Rosette Cluster (NGC 2244).  Covering an area of the sky about 5 times that of the full moon the Rosette nebula is one of the finest objects of its kind.

This image, taken on the night of February 29th, is a stack of only ten 3 minute exposures.  I had spent most of the evening imaging the Christmas Tree Cluster when I decided to target the Rosette for as many subs as I could get before it sank below the tree line.  The result is a fairly nice photo of the nebula, albeit a little bit noisy due to the small number of subs.  As soon as the sky clears up in the next week or so I'll image another 20 or so subs and process them together with the 10 I have here.  The result of that collection should render a really clean image. 

What Time is it? It depends ...

So what, exactly, is time?  Something that we all experience every moment  (there, a manifestation of time), yet no one can definitively characterize, explain, and quantify just what 'it' is!

Carlo Rovelli provides some interesting insight into the 'arrow of time', quantum theory, and hot black holes.   Read about it here. 

The Christmas Tree Cluster

Gotta take advantage of clear nights whenever they occur, which, as of late, is not all that frequent. But last evening was one of those nights.

I needed to check out my software and the new camera attachment so I mounted the Hyperstar wide field lens on my EdgeHD11 and setup for some imaging of NGC 2264, the Christmas Tree Cluster.

After taking 30, 180sec subs and processing with Nebulosity, PixInsight and PSP, the result was pretty darn good.  I can improve it some more once I take some flats and re-process the images, but here is the initial result.

NGC 2264 - The Christmas Tree Cluster - February 29, 2016
EdgeHD11 w/Hyperstar - 30x180sec
Imaging camera:  QHY10

NGC 2264 is actually a double object: the Christmas Tree cluster which is a collection of stars whose pattern outlines a slightly upside down Christmas tree, and the Cone Nebula, a diffuse nebula south of the cluster. The cone's shape comes from dark, cold molecular hydrogen and dust in front of a faint emission nebula illuminated by S Monocerotis, the brightest star of NGC 2264.  All of the objects are located in the Monoceros constellation and are located about 800 parsecs or 2600 light-years from Earth.

Down to the lower right is another nebula, NGC 2261 (also known as Hubble's Variable Nebula).  It is illuminated by the star R Monocerotis (R Mon), which is not directly visible itself.  It is believed that the nebula varies in brightness and structure because of dense clouds of dust that periodically block the light from the star.

Twin Black Holes inside a single star - how weird is that?!

Credit: Swinburne Astronomy Productions

Two weeks ago I reported what could very well be the greatest 'history making' discovery in the past 100 years - the evidence of Gravitational Waves.  These waves, produced by the merger of two massive black holes, were detected by the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) instrument in September. Now it appears that the two black holes might have resided inside a single, massive star whose death generated the gamma-ray burst. 

Read more at: Phys.Org

New research suggests that the two black holes might have resided inside a single, massive star whose death generated the gamma-ray burst.

Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2016-02-ligo-twin-black-holes-born.html#jCp

New research suggests that the two black holes might have resided inside a single, massive star whose death generated the gamma-ray burst.

Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2016-02-ligo-twin-black-holes-born.html#jCp

New research suggests that the two black holes might have resided inside a single, massive star whose death generated the gamma-ray burst.

Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2016-02-ligo-twin-black-holes-born.html#jCp

Twin comets approach closely in March

Illustration by Eddie Irizarry using Stellarium; EarthSky

Some of you might already know that one of my favorite activities as an amateur astronomer is to image comets.  Well, just found out that not one, but two new comets are heading our way.  Unfortunately they will be very difficult (probably impossible) to see with the naked eye.  No matter, I'll be out as soon as I get a chance and conditions are right and capture these beauties.  Probably won't make for a fancy picture, but just the fact that I caught them in an image against a starfield is good enough for me.

Details can be found at EarthSky.

Won't this weather ever clear?

Well I'm still waiting for a run of clear skies, preferably without the near full moon in the way.  The only two nights that were favorable a week or so ago I was sick, or had other plans.

On the night of February 11th - 12th I did manage to get the scope setup and start my imaging run for the second of three awards on Astronomy Forums for imaging the Messier objects.  There are 110 of them total (109 by some counts since one may be a duplicate - M101, a spiral galaxy may have been misidentified as another object M102).  The idea behind the awards is to recognize astro imagers success in the field by photographing the whole set of Messier objects.  You get an award for the first 40, then one for the next 40, and finally one for the complete set.  Of course the first 40 is fairly easy as we usually go for the 'low hanging fruit'.  I completed my first 40 last year.

So it was off to image M95 and M96.  M95 is a barred spiral galaxy in the constellation Leo, the lion.  M96 is a nearby galaxy almost in the same field of view of my camera.  I set up the scope to automate the imaging of both galaxies during the night while I, of course, slept, since the next day was a work day.  I had planned to take 30 subs of each object, each one an exposure of 3min. 

When I checked the image capture on the morning of the 12th I discovered that I actually got 60 subs of M95 and none of M96.  After examination of the software logs later that day I noticed I had entered the commands to the scope incorrectly, and alas the issue was not with faulty software, but with faulty human operator :)

Anyway, I did get a pretty good image of M95, and as soon as the skies clear and the moon leaves I'll go for M96 again. 

The object centering function is still not working correctly (and I really believe it is a software or hardware problem this time and not human error) so I had to crop the image a bit.

Rosetta’s lander faces eternal hibernation

ESA/Rosetta/Philae/CIVA

Philae ... So long and farewell!

With absolute silence since its last call to mother ship Rosetta back in July, the Philae lander is facing conditions on Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko that make it extremely unlikely that it will recover and 'phone home' once more.  But much of the science that was planned was completed, and Philae's landing was still an amazing feat; an accomplishment that made history.

A complete summary and prognosis can be found at Astronomy.com.

Big News!!! Einstein's gravitational waves 'seen' from black holes

Wow.  About 100 years since Einstein theorized gravitational waves they are finally observed.

Scientists are claiming a stunning discovery in their quest to fully understand gravity.

They have observed the warping of space-time generated by the collision of two black holes more than a billion light-years from Earth.

The international team says the first detection of these gravitational waves will usher in a new era for astronomy.

It is the culmination of decades of searching and could ultimately offer a window on the Big Bang.
The research, by the LIGO Collaboration, has been published today in the journal Physical Review Letters.

Read about it at the BBC and Astronomy Magazine.

Small Asteroid to Pass Close to Earth March 5

A small asteroid that two years ago flew past Earth at a comfortable distance of about 1.3 million miles (2 million kilometers) will safely fly by our planet again in a few weeks, though this time it may be much closer.
During the upcoming March 5 flyby, asteroid 2013 TX68 could fly past Earth as far out as 9 million miles (14 million kilometers) or as close as 11,000 miles (17,000 kilometers).

Full story on the JPL's site.

God's Awesome Universe

A video by Mikey

This is a collection of the best images of 2014-2015 taken by me on location in Reisterstown, Maryland and Luray, Virginia.

All images were taken through my Celestron EdgeHD-11" telescope on a CGEM-DX mount.
Planets imaged via an ASI120MC planetary camera and processed in Registax 6.
Deep Space Objects imaged with a Canon 50D and QHY10 Astro-camera stacked via Nebulosity4 (Stark Labs) and post processed in PixInsight (Pleiades Astrophoto - Pixinsight.com) and Paint Shop Pro (Corel.com).

Guiding by PHD2 (Stark Labs, www.stark-labs.com)
Image acquisition software APT - Astro Photography Tool (www.astroplace.net) and SGP - Sequence Generator Pro (Main Sequence Soiftware (www.mainsequencesoftware.com/)