The Leo Triplet M65, M66 & NGC3628
The Leo Triplet captured in March 2022 as a 2-panel mosaic. By Dean Ashton
North American Nebula by Dr Nigel Price
North American Nebula reprocessed and drizzled 2x, SHO, took this in April
NGC 6888
The Crescent Nebula 2nd attempt. The first was back in June 2021. This one has 16hrs over 6 nights from July to September. By Barry Trudgian
NGC4244 on the lower left and NGC4214 middle right.
It’s NGC4214 that piqued my interest. The most obvious is how chaotic it looks. On further investigation it’s classed as an ‘Irregular’. In my copy of ‘Hubble Atlas of Galaxies’ it goes further and names them as Irr Type 1 or Megallanic Cloud type irregulars. If they took the Large Megallanic Cloud and repositioned it 11 mly away it would look very much like NGC4214 shown here.
It’s also called a s Starburst galaxy, which is one with an exceptionally high rate of star formation compared to the average. This activity is so great, that around the 6 or so blue star clusters, the stellar winds form bubbles in the surrounding gas. Over time these bubble increase in size as the Hot ‘O’ type stars within them grow older. This activity is so great that these galaxies are often called Wolf-Reyet galaxies. As well as containing lots of new young stars, this galaxy contains many old red supergiants which suggest that this bout of current star formation is not the first and with the abundant supply of hydrogen will likely continue to do so in the future.
Gamma Cygni by Dr Nigel Price
HOO image of Gamma Cygni nebula in Cygnus imaged over the last week in dribs and drabs. Only three hours of data finally used. But I’m really starting to enjoy this bit of the sky as there is so much to see and it is relatively bright in Halpha and OIII.
Lagoon & Trifid Nebula
by Dr Nigel Price
All images are Copyright of the respective owners names against each image.