Ngc 6946(Fireworks galaxy) & Ngc 6939

 

Telescope : SW Esprit 100ED

Mount : SW EQ6-ri 

Camera : ZWO 533mc

Guiding : 8x50 SW finder with QHY 5IIL

Filters:   Total exposure time :100x180min (5 hours) with ir-cut 2' filter SVBony

Programs I have used : Nina 3.0 _ PixInsight 1.8.9-3

 

NGC 6946, sometimes referred to as the Fireworks Galaxy, is a grand design, face-on intermediate spiral galaxy with a small bright nucleus, whose location in the sky straddles the boundary between the northern constellations of Cepheus and Cygnus. Its distance from Earth is about 25.2 million light-years or 7.72 megaparsecs, similar to the distance of M101 (NGC 5457) in the constellation Ursa Major.  Both were once considered to be part of the Local Group,^[6] but are now known to be among the dozen bright spiral galaxies near the Milky Way but beyond the confines of the Local Group. NGC 6946 lies within the Virgo Supercluster.

The galaxy was discovered by William Herschel on 9 September 1798. Based on an estimation by the Third Reference Catalogue of Bright Galaxies (RC3) in 1991, the galaxy has a D₂₅ B-band isophotal diameter of 26.77 kiloparsecs (87,300 light-years).^[1][3] It is heavily obscured by interstellar matter due to its location close to the galactic plane of the Milky Way.  Due to its prodigious star formation it has been classified as an active starburst galaxy.  NGC 6946 has also been classified as a double-barred spiral galaxy, with the inner, smaller bar presumably responsible for funneling gas into its center.

 NGC 6939 is an open cluster in the constellation Cepheus. It was discovered by William Herschel in 1798. The cluster lies 2/3° northwest from the spiral galaxy NGC 6946. The cluster lies approximately 4,000 light years away and it is over a billion years old. 

NGC 6939 is located near the border of the constellations Cepheus and Cygnus, at the southwest corner of Cepheus. The open cluster is located two degrees southwest of Eta Cephei and 2/3° northwest from the spiral galaxy NGC 6946, which has visual magnitude 8.7. They appear as two patches of haze with 10x50 binoculars. NGC 6939 can be seen and glimpsed with 7x35 binoculars where as 25x200 binoculars are required to start resolve the cluster.The cluster can be glimpsed with 4 inches telescope and is resolved at x72 magnification. NGC 6939 is included in the Herschel 400 Catalogue.

NGC 5906 Splinter Galaxy

 

Telescope : SW Esprit 100ED

Mount : SW EQ6-ri 

Camera : ZWO 533mc

Guiding : 8x50 SW finder with QHY 5IIL

Filters:   Total exposure time :9hours & 30minutes with IR-Cut filter from 2nights

Programs I have used : Nina 3.0 _ PixInsight 1.8.9-3

 

NGC 5907 (also known as NGC 5906, Knife Edge Galaxy, or Splinter Galaxy) is a spiral galaxy located approximately 46.5 million light years from Earth German-British astronomer William Herschel discovered the galaxy on 5 May 1788.Its most notable features are its large stellar stream and ultraluminous X-ray source 

 

NGC 5907 has an anomalously low metallicity and few detectable giant stars, being apparently composed almost entirely of dwarf stars. It is a member of the NGC 5866 Group.

NGC 5907 has long been considered a prototypical example of a warped spiral in relative isolation. In 1998, a faint ring structure, likely caused by a disrupted dwarf spheroidal galaxy, was first observed around the galaxy.This challenged the assumption of isolation and suggests the gravitational perturbations induced by the stream progenitor may be the cause for the warp. Then, in 2008, an international team of astronomers announced the presence of an extended double loop tidal stream coiling around the galaxy.  The existence of part of these tidal streams has been recently challenged by some deeper surveys, which show only a single knee-shaped stream as opposed to the full double loop structure.  This shorter stream has a length of 45′ in the sky (or a physical size of 220 kpc) and has a surface brightness ranging from 27.6 mag/arcsec² at its brightest to 28.8 at its faintest.

An ultraluminous X-ray source, NGC 5907 ULX-1, is located in the galaxy.  This source is also called an ultraluminous X-ray pulsar (ULXP) because it exhibits a rapid pulsation effect. This pulsation has a period of 5.7 days and is caused by a rotating neutron star orbiting a high mass companion.  The neutron star itself has a spin period of 1.13 seconds and seems to be accelerating; its period ten years prior was 1.43 seconds. It is one of the brightest such source yet discovered with a luminosity over 10⁴¹ erg/s (7 orders of magnitude more luminous than the Sun). Notably, its peak luminosity is over 1000 times greater than the Eddington luminosity for a neutron star.

from Wikipedia 

 

M 106 & NGC 4217

 

Telescope : SW Esprit 100ED

Mount : SW EQ6-ri 

Camera : ZWO 533mc

Guiding : 8x50 SW finder with QHY 5IIL

Filters:   Total exposure time :9hours & 54minutes with IR-Cut filter

Programs I have used : Nina 3.0 _ PixInsight 1.8.9-3

 

 Messier 106 (also known as NGC 4258) is a spiral galaxy in the constellation Canes Venatici. It was discovered by Pierre Méchain in 1781. M106 is at a distance of about 22 to 25 million light-years away from Earth. It is also a Seyfert II galaxy, which means that due to x-rays and unusual emission lines detected, it is suspected that part of the galaxy is falling into a supermassive black hole in the center. NGC 4217 is a possible companion galaxy of Messier 106.

Rosette Nebula(NGC 2244)

 

Telescope : SW Esprit 100ED

Mount : SW EQ6-ri 

Camera : ZWO 533 mc pro

Guiding : 8x50 SW finder with QHY 5IIL

Filters:   Total exposure time :290minutes with L-Enhance & ir-cut filter

Programs I have used : Nina 3.0 _ PixInsight 1.8.9-3

The Rosette Nebula is a vast emission nebula located about 5,200 light years away. The star forming region lies near a large molecular cloud in the constellation of Monoceros, the Unicorn. It is closely associated with the young open star cluster NGC 2244.

Also known as the Satellite Cluster, NGC 2244 appears at the centre of the Rosette. The hot young stars of the cluster were formed from the nebula’s material in the last 5 million years.

The stars in the Satellite Cluster are responsible for the nebula’s glow. Their radiation ionizes the surrounding clouds of nebulosity, causing them to emit their own light. The nebula glows in the red part of the spectrum because the powerful ultraviolet radiation from the stars strips electrons from the nebula’s hydrogen atoms.

The Rosette Nebula is a very active stellar nursery. It is home to numerous Herbig-Haro objects and Herbig Ae/Be stars, Bok globules, T Tauri stars and clusters of newly formed stars. The dark filaments of dust extending toward the centre of the nebula, sometimes called “elephant trunks,” are shaped by the stellar winds and radiation from hot young stars and electromagnetic forces.

IC 1805 in SHO(Heart nebula)

Telescope : SW Esprit 100ED

Mount : SW EQ6-ri 

Camera : ZWO 533 mc pro

Guiding : 8x50 SW finder with QHY 5IIL

Filters:   Total exposure time :6 hours (72x300sec) with L-enchance 1.25

Programs I have used : Nina 3.0 _ PixInsight 1.8.9-3

The Heart Nebula (also known as the Running Dog Nebula, Sharpless 2-190) is an emission nebula, 7500 light years away from Earth and located in the Perseus Arm of the Galaxy in the constellation Cassiopeia. It was discovered by William Herschel on 3 November 1787. It displays glowing ionized hydrogen gas and darker dust lanes.

The brightest part of the nebula (a knot at its western edge) is separately classified as NGC 896, because it was the first part of the nebula to be discovered. The nebula's intense red output and its morphology are driven by the radiation emanating from a small group of stars near the nebula's center. This open cluster of stars, known as Collinder 26, Melotte 15, or IC 1805, contains a few bright stars nearly 50 times the mass of the Sun, and many more dim stars that are only a fraction of the Sun's mass.

The Heart Nebula is also made up of ionised oxygen and sulfur gasses, responsible for the rich blue and orange colours seen in narrowband images. The shape of the nebula is driven by stellar winds from the hot stars in its core. The nebula also spans almost 2 degrees in the sky, covering an area four times that of the diameter of the full moon.

IC 5070 Pelican nebula -Hubble palette-

This is the RGB version from 533mc pro

 

Telescope : SW Esprit 100ED

Mount : SW EQ6-ri 

Camera : ZWO 533 mc pro

Guiding : 8x50 SW finder with QHY 5IIL

Filters:   Total exposure time :5 hours (60x300sec) with L-enchance 1.25

Programs I have used : Nina 3.0 _ PixInsight 1.8.9-3

 

The Pelican Nebula (also known as IC 5070 and IC 5067) is an H II region associated with the North America Nebula in the constellation Cygnus. The gaseous contortions of this emission nebula bear a resemblance to a pelican, giving rise to its name.The Pelican Nebula is located nearby first magnitude star Deneb, and is divided from its more prominent neighbour, the North America Nebula, by a foreground molecular cloud filled with dark dust. Both are part of the larger H II region of Westerhout 40.

The Pelican is much studied because it has a particularly active mix of star formation and evolving gas clouds. The light from young energetic stars is slowly transforming cold gas to hot and causing an ionization front gradually to advance outward. Particularly dense filaments of cold gas are seen to still remain, and among these are found two jets emitted from the Herbig–Haro object 555. Millions of years from now this nebula might no longer be known as the Pelican, as the balance and placement of stars and gas will leave something that appears completely different.