Study of the Beehive cluster at the heart of Cancer.

 

The heart of Cancer – Praesepe/Beehive Cluster/M44. Also known as the Manger and, interestingly, a chariot from the underworld. Until a couple hundred years ago, this cluster (one of the closest to Earth) went from what was believed to be a nebulous cloud to an amazing cluster once the telescopes were in wide use. 

 

Zoomed in even further, the heart of Cancer. Like I said before, at 600 light years distant and at about 600 million years of age, it’s one of the closest star clusters.

 

Even closer. At 600 million years old, it is an infant compared to our Sun. Yet it is very close to dying. The red giants and white dwarf population is enough to verify that. It’s distance, age and types of stars not only make this cluster very similar to another close cluster, Hyades, it also has led the scientific community to believe Praesepe/Beehive and Hyades were born from the same cloud of gas. This would make the clusters (and the stars within) siblings, even though they reside in two separate constellations (Cancer and Taurus).

The stars within are of higher mass, which means they fuse more hydrogen and such, which leads them to have much shorter lifespans (relatively speaking). 

Messier 41 (another)

Open star cluster Messier (Object) 41 (NGC 2287)

I’ve been getting tired of aiming at Jupiter, the Orion Nebula and the Pleiades. It is really difficult aiming, zooming, and then keeping objects in the viewfinder. Things in the sky move a lot faster when zoomed 35x-140x. Dimmer objects don’t even show themselves until after the exposure, so it can be frustrating. That’s why I have targeted the items I’ve been posting; they’re easy to see/find.

So, I decided to aim for something a little harder to see. M41 is easy to find – it’s 4 degrees due south of Sirius (at the right time). Sirius is the brightest star in the sky, so getting a ballpark estimate is easy enough. However, being that M41 is a faint smudge, usually only seen on the peripheral when I look through binoculars. In wide, un-zoomed shots, it appears as a definite objects, though just a smudge with 2-4 stars individually observable. I figured it would definitely be a step in the more difficult direction.. but if I want to be able to trust myself to get all the clusters and nebulas when Sagittarius comes up, I better get cracking now, right?

Initially I didn’t even believe I got M41. I saw no smudge or cluster. I’ve also not had such a nice zoom at my disposal until this season, so I didn’t believe the seemingly scattered stars I got was anything near being a star cluster. I was wrong. My aim was pretty true.

It isn’t even half as bright as Pleiades, and now I know why. The previous photo I posted before this is of Pleiades, and it’s around 400 light years away. Lots of bright blue stars in it. M41, however, is about 2,300 light years away with less stars. It wouldn’t be visible, but it contains some very bright white dwarf stars, along with a rabid pack of red giants. These are easily seen here. Several of the largest and brightest stars in M41 are on display. A lot of it’s brothers and sisters are faint, but also visible. I would say I got about a third of the 100 stars in this cluster and am quite happy with the results.

Canis Major/Dog Star (Sirius) Chart.

I didn’t know I would start doing a series of these, but I did.. so, I decided to do ones which were more pertinent to what the night skies look like currently in the northern hemisphere. Orion is pretty high in the sky after sunset, and to it’s left (east) shortly thereafter is the hunter’s (Orion’s) dog, Canis Major. This constellation is easy to find. In heavily light-pollutued skies, it’s brightest star, Sirius (the Dog Star), is the brightest star in the sky. Just make sure to not mistake Jupiter, which is currently high overhead in Gemini), for Sirius. The Dog Star/Sirius is closer to the southern horizon and near Orion (remember this when locating).

This section of sky lies on the plain of the Milky Way. While nowhere near as noticeable as the bright lane of light near Sagittarius (towards the galactic center), it still contains a ton of star clusters and nebulae. Most of your deep sky objects will lie on this plain.

So, next photo/labeled photo I will post will contain Cygnus, the Swan, and the Cygnus Rift. The Rift is a dark lane of dust that blocks a strip of the bright lane that is the Milky Way. Cool stuff in that area.

Orion & Orionid

Took this photo late one night a month or two back.

Look closely and you can see things the average person would not be able to see, either because it’s way too dim or less-than-perfect sky conditions. At the top, Messier 35 – a fine example of an open cluster. In the middle of Orion’s left/upheld arm, NGC 2169 is another open cluster, albeit slightly dimmer than M35. Open clusters form from the same dust and gas clouds and slowly head off in their separate directions.

To Orion’s left is a cool multi-itemed treat. There are a few objects with their own names or designations, but they are all related and associated to one another. The two main objects and their common names are the Rosetta Nebula (designated Caldwell 49) and it’s star cluster, the Satellite Cluster.

The complex has the following NGC designations:

• NGC 2237 – Part of the nebulous region (Also used to denote whole nebula)
• NGC 2238 – Part of the nebulous region
• NGC 2239 – Part of the nebulous region (Discovered by John Herschel)
• NGC 2244 – The open cluster within the nebula (Discovered by John Flamsteed in 1690)
• NGC 2246 – Part of the nebulous region

The cluster and nebula lie at a distance of some 5,200 light-years fromEarth (although estimates of the distance vary considerably, down to 4,900 light-years.^[3]) and measure roughly 130 light years in diameter. Theradiation from the young stars excite the atoms in the nebula, causing them to emit radiation themselves producing the emission nebula we see. The mass of the nebula is estimated to be around 10,000 solar masses.

Also within the photo are more famous and obvious objects. There is the M42/M43 Great Orion Nebula complex which contains several young stars and proto-planetary disks (disks of gas and dust that will one day form solar systems). Also, above the nebula, yet also located within Orion’s sword is open cluster NGC 1981. Near the bottom end of the photo is the Dog Star, aka Sirius. It is the dog constellation. Below it is a wonderful cluster, Messier 41.

Lastly, the meteor caught during this exposure is in the right place and fit all the criteria for me to consider it a 99% chance of being an Orionid meteor. This would also mean that this meteor came from the famed Halley’s Comet!

Pleiades (Seven Sisters, The Sailing Ones, Messier 45)

I’ve written a lot about this cluster. I’ve seen so many amazing photos, yet I am still excited whenever I can personally get a little closer to it. Seeing it close enough that I had to zoom out to get the classic little dipper shape all within the viewfinder was a first for me.

I got at least 50-60 of the 1,000 stars known to exist within this cluster. If you look closely, you can see some of the nebulosity around a few of the stars. It was originally thought this was leftover stuff from it’s creation 250 million years ago (VERY young), but it turns out this is just the medium the cluster is currently plowing through.

With the Moon waning and getting lower and lower each night, I can start shooting objects like this. I also got Andromeda last night, though not as well as I would have liked. Oh well, save something for next time.

My one-on-one with the Pleiades Cluster/Seven Sisters.

Hard to believe how fast we circulate the Sun. I took this at about 1am. Just a few months ago I would be outside at about the same time, if not later, waiting for Saturn to overtake the tall trees around the house. I don’t have a great camera, but the last time Alcyone and company were up, I did not have the little nuances down in how to resolves as much detail as I could.

It’s different this time around. The pictures this time around are great. It has turned from 6-7+ blurry balls (last year) to roughly 35 points of light.

Interesting things to know about the Seven Sisters/Pleiades.. it is one of the closest, brightest and youngest star clusters to the Earth. It is about 8 light years wide, but it’s tidal influence (due to the large amount of mass in a relatively small area) reaches about 45 light years. It is roughly 400 light years away. It is barely visible here, but Hubble easily catches the blue haze reflection nebula surrounding the cluster. It was thought to be leftover gas from the creation of the cluster, but is actually gaseous interstellar medium it just happens to be moving through. The cluster also is theorized to carry a ton of brown dwarfs. Failed stars.

Our Sun is close to 5 BILLION years old. This cluster, in comparison, is a group of newborns. Estimations have it being born around just 50-100 million years old. The dinosaurs were going extinct, or were entirely gone when this cluster began lighting up the sky.

If you want to know what this cluster looked like before it started forming stars, take a look at the Orion Nebula this winter. They’re forming under similar conditions. Coincidentally enough, Pleiades is actually moving towards the Orion constellation.

The seven brightest stars have cool names. The brightest form what looks like a small dipper, with the brightest and largest being the one that seems to connect the handle to the spoon. It’s name is Alcyone. It actually has a binary star orbiting it at about the same distance that Jupiter orbits our Sun. That binary also has two star companions orbiting it. The other bright stars in this cluster (the Greeks considered it a constellation I believe, as many other ancient cultures from Native Americans to Egyptians revered this cluster. The Pantheon was built in relation to where Pleiades rises from the horizon) have pretty cool names.

They are: Pleione, Atlas (the two stars at the end of the ‘handle’), Alcyone (already mentioned), Merope, Electra, Caleano, Maia, Taygeta and Sterope.

But ultimately, I just posted this because it’s so amazing and beautiful. It’s somehow empowering to sit in the middle of a neighborhood road with a jungle surrounding me, shielding the camera from any ambient light.. having the tree tops frame these sparkling gems, for lack of a better term. Just.. hanging out. The joy of it being in the middle of the night made it feel as if I had this sight all to myself. It’s just a personally held illusion, but a beautiful one nonetheless.

Two star clusters (M6 & M7) on the Scorpion’s tail.

Not the best photo, being the city lights dull the sky.. but in going through the photos I took last night, I saw these two really nice clusters (M6, the big one on the left and M7, to the right and not as large) by the horizon. Quick research revealed they were the 6th and 7th items Charles Messier listed in his famous list of deep sky objects.

Note: He made this list awhile back, mainly so other people looking at the sky would not mistake these particular objects as comets.)