Methane Sea on Titan

We knew that Saturn’s moon Titan had seas and lakes of liquid hydrocarbons, but their exact composition was unknown until recently.

Sunlight glints off of Titan’s northern seas this near-infrared,
color mosaic from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft. Image via NASA/JPL/Univ. Arizona/Univ. Idaho

Complete story at EarthSky

Recovery Attempts End for Hitomi X-ray Satellite

An artist's conception of Hitomi in space.
JAXA

On a sadder note, the X-Ray Observatory launched by JAXA (Japanese Space Agency) seems doomed. Observations show that the solar panels were flung off during the spacecraft's too-fast rotation, depriving Hitomi of power and ending the mission.  All this because the spacecraft's attitude control system (ACS), which keeps the spacecraft pointed in the right direction, determined that the spacecraft was rotating — even though it wasn't. So the system commanded the spacecraft's reaction wheels to counter the rotation, and that caused the spacecraft to actually start spinning. And things went 'down hill' from there.

Complete story (and timeline of events) at SkyandTelescope.com

Observations show that the solar panels were flung off during the spacecraft's too-fast rotation, depriving Hitomi of power and ending the mission. - See more at: http://www.skyandtelescope.com/astronomy-news/recovery-for-hitomi-observatory-now-unlikely/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_campaign=sky-mya-nl-160429&utm_content=840839_SKY_HP_eNL_160429&utm_medium=email#sthash.UxgGeDzm.dpuf

Observations show that the solar panels were flung off during the spacecraft's too-fast rotation, depriving Hitomi of power and ending the mission. - See more at: http://www.skyandtelescope.com/astronomy-news/recovery-for-hitomi-observatory-now-unlikely/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_campaign=sky-mya-nl-160429&utm_content=840839_SKY_HP_eNL_160429&utm_medium=email#sthash.UxgGeDzm.dpuf

Observations show that the solar panels were flung off during the spacecraft's too-fast rotation, depriving Hitomi of power and ending the mission. - See more at: http://www.skyandtelescope.com/astronomy-news/recovery-for-hitomi-observatory-now-unlikely/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_campaign=sky-mya-nl-160429&utm_content=840839_SKY_HP_eNL_160429&utm_medium=email#sthash.UxgGeDzm.dpuf

Mission Manager Update: Kepler recovered and returned to the K2 mission

NASA

The Kepler spacecraft has recovered from a system failure and, as of Friday, April 22, is back on the job as the K2 mission searching for exoplanets — planets beyond our solar system.

Full story at Astronomy.com

So, you think human-looking robots are far off in the future?

CNBC via YouTube

I don't know about you, but I was a bit surprised to see just how far we have come in creating robots that are very human like in appearance and in facial expressions and voice mannerisms. Check out this Discovery News report on a robot named Sophia.

Final Rosette and Markarian's Chain

I've been in conversations with Ken at MainSequence Software about some issues with SGP.  SGP (Sequence Generator Pro) is the software that essentially runs all my equipment - the telescope, cameras and focuser. It is the tool I use to remotely operate the telescope.

It seems that some functions of the software weren't working properly with my QHY10 camera.  New software was released and so I had to test it to let Ken know if the fixes worked. So, Tuesday evening the skies were fairly clear and I could test the software. And, since the Rosette was still visible in the west I decided to get those additional subs I wanted to add to my existing set to really get the final image to have as little noise as possible (a later post will explain this process for anyone that is interested. For now just know that the more images you stack together, the less the noise).

With 56 subs stacked and processed (2.8 hours of image integration) here is the final result.

Rosette Nebula (NGC 2238)
EdgeHD-11 w/Hyperstar
QHY10 camera - 56x180sec

I was also able to get a photo of Markarian's Chain - a stretch of galaxies that forms part of the Virgo Cluster. It is called a chain because, when viewed from Earth, the galaxies lie along a smoothly curved line. It was named after the Armenian astrophysicist, B. E. Markarian, who discovered their common motion in the early 1960s.

Markarian's Chain - M86 and M84 to the right; M87 lower left
EdgeHD-11 w/Hyperstar
QHY10 -  41x180sec 

If you zoom in on the image you can see many more galaxies scattered about in this rich region of the constellation Virgo known as the Virgo Cluster.

Ceres' Puzzling Bright Spots, Giant Mountain Feature in New Close-Up Photos

THE WOODLANDS, Texas — Ceres is coming into focus, but many mysteries about the dwarf planet remain.

Newly released images captured by NASA's Dawn spacecraft reveal a close-up look at Ceres' odd bright spots and giant mountain, and hint at the existence of ice sheets at the dwarf planet's poles.

See more at: Space.com

ExoMars sets off to solve the Red Planet’s mysteries

The spacecraft has begun a seven-month journey to Mars, where it will address unsolved mysteries of the planet’s atmosphere.

Read complete story in Astronomy.com

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.