"Cosmic Soup" (not an official name...just what I think it looks like).
This photo was taken through my wide-angle Redcat 51 telescope.
Here are a few things to ponder while you relax and stare millions of light years into the past:
- The Firework Galaxy (in the middle of the photo) is 25 million light years away. Later this year, I will post a close up photo of this galaxy that I took with my bigger telescope.
- It is considered to be a "starburst galaxy" -- one that forms stars between 10 and 100 times the rate of a "typical" spiral galaxy.
- The star cluster to the right of the galaxy is "NGC 6939." It is estimated to be between 1 and 1.3 billion years old.
- There are 3 types of "star clusters." This one is considered to be an "open" cluster, where the stars were all formed from the same dust cloud (nebula) at around the same time.
- Stars in open clusters are gravitationally bound together but are not particularly stable, as they can be sucked away from the cluster when traveling past larger objects.
I find that this photo is best enjoyed with a cup of tea and listening to space ambience music (...which is why I turned the photo into a 2 minute video with music).
Full size high resolution photo: https://astrob.in/full/s8nqd6/0/
This photo was taken through my wide-angle Redcat 51 telescope.
Here are a few things to ponder while you relax and stare millions of light years into the past:
- The Firework Galaxy (in the middle of the photo) is 25 million light years away. Later this year, I will post a close up photo of this galaxy that I took with my bigger telescope.
- It is considered to be a "starburst galaxy" -- one that forms stars between 10 and 100 times the rate of a "typical" spiral galaxy.
- The star cluster to the right of the galaxy is "NGC 6939." It is estimated to be between 1 and 1.3 billion years old.
- There are 3 types of "star clusters." This one is considered to be an "open" cluster, where the stars were all formed from the same dust cloud (nebula) at around the same time.
- Stars in open clusters are gravitationally bound together but are not particularly stable, as they can be sucked away from the cluster when traveling past larger objects.
I find that this photo is best enjoyed with a cup of tea and listening to space ambience music (...which is why I turned the photo into a 2 minute video with music).
Full size high resolution photo: https://astrob.in/full/s8nqd6/0/
