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| Andromeda Galaxy | ||||||||||||||||||||||
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| The Great Andromeda Galaxy, M31, is the farthest object most of us will ever see with the naked eye. At a distance of over 2 million light years, this galaxy is so huge that it occupies an area in the sky several times larger than the full moon! Although similar to our own Milky Way Galaxy, M31 is twice as large, containing 300 billion suns. Billions of stars are packed tightly together at the galaxy's core, creating the bright central glow, concealing a central massive black hole . Two satellite galaxies of M31 are in the same view. M32, a dwarf elliptical galaxycontaining a mere 3 billion solar masses, is tucked in tightly on the left of M31. M110 is slightly larger, seen in the bottom right of this image. This image combined 15 luminance, 14 red, 8 green, and 8 blue 5-minute exposures through a Takahashi Sky90 refractor with a reducer to yeild 400mm focal length, using an ST10 XME camera, for a total imaging time of 3 hours 45 minutes. Two years earlier I imaged this same object from my backyard, shown below. Which do you prefer? |
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| Music - Chariots of Fire theme.. | ||||||||||||||||||||||
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| This image combined 51 luminance, 10 red, 10 green, and 14 blue 2-minute exposures through a 4" refractor using an ST10 XME camera, for a total imaging time of 2 hours 50 minutes. | ||||||||||||||||||||||