Crab Nebula as you've never seen it before

[Drone]

The Crab Nebula (M1, NGC 1952 or Taurus A) lies ~6500 ly away from Earth and is the remnant of a dramatic explosion, called a supernova, originally seen by Chinese Astronomers in 1054 AD. Starting out at 12-15 times more massive than the Sun, all that was left after the dramatic death of the star is a tiny, rapidly rotating neutron star and a complex network of ejected stellar material.

Previous infrared images of the Crab Nebula, using the Spitzer Space Telescope, used much shorter wavelengths and so only showed the warmer dust. Spitzer found only a tiny amount of dust, simply because it missed the massive reservoir of colder dust now known to exist. Herschel, observing at longer wavelengths, is able to detect both warm dust (shown in green/blue in the image) and also cool dust (shown as yellow/orange), some as cold as -260 Celsius. This has allowed astronomers to measure the total mass of dust for the first time.

It's amazing that Herschel Space Observatory managed to get such details which Spitzer Space Telescope and Hubble couldn't.
There's enough dust to make around 30 000 - 40 000 Earths.
We can see these filaments of dust in the far-infrared region of the electromagnetic spectrum (right part of the image).

[lyndonguitar]

Looks beautiful!

6500 light years away... so what we are seeing has already happened 6500 years ago right?

[Drone]

Originally Posted by lyndonguitar

Looks beautiful!

6500 light years away... so what we are seeing has already happened 6500 years ago right?

Ancient Chinese saw that explosion in 1054 AD It was so bright that you could easily read a book in the nighttime

So let's do some math: distance is 6500 ly and Chinese saw that in 1054 AD. It means it happened much much earlier.

[3870x2]

Originally Posted by lyndonguitar

Looks beautiful!

6500 light years away... so what we are seeing has already happened 6500 years ago right?

Correct.

Originally Posted by Drone

Ancient Chinese saw that explosion in 1054 AD It was so bright that you could easily read a book in the nighttime

So let's do some math: distance is 6500 ly and Chinese saw that in 1054 AD. It means it happened much much earlier.

Or so I thought. Is there a reason that the light from the nebula would travel faster than light? or has the distance between us and the crab nebula expanded between now and 1054 AD?

[Drone]

Originally Posted by 3870x2

Is there a reason that the light from the nebula would travel faster than light? or has the distance between us and the crab nebula expanded between now and 1054 AD?

They said that it was seen in 1054 and lasted for two years. What we see now is all the radiation that left after the explosion.

So I think actual explosion happened 6500 (distance) + 1054 (when it was observed) = 7554 years ago I might be wrong


Lol here it says that Crab Nebula is 6000 ly away, gosh

[Drone]

Some other goodness (brand new images) I wanna post here:





NGC 5189 is a planetary nebula that lies 1800 ly away in the southern constellation Musca. The gorgeous image above shows the glowing streamers of oxygen, sulfur and hydrogen that are being blown far into space from the hot star HD 117622 at its heart.

Ok now some other crazy stuff



Cygnus Loop, the gaseous remains of a supernova that occurred 5000-10000 years ago, spans an area nearly 45 times the width of the full Moon in the sky. First noted in 1784 by William Herschel. This remnant is located 1500 ly away in the constellation Cygnus.

In the image, hydrogen alpha, sulphur, and oxygen ions correspond to the red, green, and blue color values, respectively.

Picture above is a preview. Actual image is One of the Largest Astronomical Images Ever Made so if you've got balls click here. It's full-size 1.7 GB TIFF image (600 megapixels) ahahaha. Or you can see smaller versions here

[Inceptor]

Originally Posted by Drone

They said that it was seen in 1054 and lasted for two years. What we see now is all the radiation that left after the explosion.

So I think actual explosion happened 6500 (distance) + 1054 (when it was observed) = 7554 years ago I might be wrong

If the distance to the nebula is 6500 ly, then the blast actually took place 6500+958=7458 years ago realtime. And it was observed on Earth in 1054 (958 years ago).

[rampage]

i was just looking at the crab nebula last night with my mew telescope, of course it was not a brilient at this but still i LOVED it along with jupiter and a few double stars that i had a good look at.

I have not done this sense my early teens, and i was texting my gf at midnight telling her every little thing i saw (she apreciated been woken up to hear all that)

[HammerON]

More cool stuff Drone

[Drone]

Originally Posted by Inceptor

If the distance to the nebula is 6500 ly, then the blast actually took place 6500+958=7458 years ago realtime. And it was observed on Earth in 1054 (958 years ago).

Fair enough.

Originally Posted by rampage

i was just looking at the crab nebula last night with my mew telescope, of course it was not a brilient at this but still i LOVED it along with jupiter and a few double stars that i had a good look at.

I have not done this sense my early teens, and i was texting my gf at midnight telling her every little thing i saw (she apreciated been woken up to hear all that)

That's sweet.

Originally Posted by HammerON

More cool stuff Drone

Yeah and now more


Here we have new image of Zeta Ophiuchi (bright blue star at center)

Like a ship plowing through still waters, the giant star Zeta Ophiuchi is speeding through space, making waves in the dust ahead. Astronomers theorize that this star was once sitting pretty next to a companion star even heftier than itself. But when that star died in a fiery explosion, Zeta Ophiuchi was kicked away and sent flying. Zeta Ophiuchi, which is 20 times more massive and 80,000 times brighter than our sun, is racing along at about 54,000 mph (24 km/s).

As it charges through the dust, which appears green, fierce stellar winds push the material into waves. Where the waves are the most compressed, and the warmest, they appear red. This bow shock is analogous to the ripples that precede the bow of a ship as it moves through the water, or the pileup of air ahead of a supersonic airplane that results in a sonic boom.

Death of one star sent other star rushing through space with enormous speed... would you ever imagine that ...

[Drone]

Crrrrrrrowd of stars NGC 6388



This image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope shows NGC 6388, a dynamically middle-aged globular cluster in the Milky Way. While the cluster formed in the distant past (like all globular clusters, it is over 10 billion years old), a study of the distribution of bright blue stars within the cluster shows that it has aged at a moderate speed, and its heaviest stars are in the process of migrating to the centre.

[Drone]

Another cool pic taken by Hubble. A baby star.

This image shows a newly-formed star called S106 IR (in the constellation Cygnus) shrouded in dust at the centre of the image, and responsible for the surrounding gas cloud's hourglass-like shape and the turbulence visible within. Light from glowing hydrogen is coloured blue in this image.

And here's video:



Groovy.

[Drone]

Cassiopea A

[theubersmurf]

people alive in 1054 AD aren't exactly ancient.

[RCoon]

Originally Posted by Drone

Some other goodness (brand new images) I wanna post here:



http://ut-images.s3.amazonaws.com/wp...xlarge_web.jpg

NGC 5189 is a planetary nebula that lies 1800 ly away in the southern constellation Musca. The gorgeous image above shows the glowing streamers of oxygen, sulfur and hydrogen that are being blown far into space from the hot star HD 117622 at its heart.

Ok now some other crazy stuff

http://ut-images.s3.amazonaws.com/wp...gloop-2000.jpg

Cygnus Loop, the gaseous remains of a supernova that occurred 5000-10000 years ago, spans an area nearly 45 times the width of the full Moon in the sky. First noted in 1784 by William Herschel. This remnant is located 1500 ly away in the constellation Cygnus.

In the image, hydrogen alpha, sulphur, and oxygen ions correspond to the red, green, and blue color values, respectively.

Picture above is a preview. Actual image is One of the Largest Astronomical Images Ever Made so if you've got balls click here. It's full-size 1.7 GB TIFF image (600 megapixels) ahahaha. Or you can see smaller versions here

Reminds me of those awesome images you can compile with Apophysis

[Cmdr. Thrawn]

Thank you for finding the great ones Drone!!! It takes time to sift through all pictures of the heavens to find the best ones like these!

[qubit]

Dammit Drone, you always find the cool astronomy.

[Drone]

Thanks qubit Here's more. A brand new image of the Orion Nebula. It's the sharpest and clearest image ever obtained. Astronomers used new adaptive optics.




Here you can find more info about Orion, there's a flash animated movie


http://hubblesite.org/gallery/tours/tour-orion/

[Drone]

A bunch of pics for today. No worries, only brand new hot and sexy images:



The heart of the barred spiral galaxy NGC 1097



The globular cluster 47 Tucanae



Spiral galaxy M101 (the Pinwheel Galaxy)



An archetypal dwarf galaxy NGC 5477

http://cdn.physorg.com/newman/gfx/ne...lexreveals.jpg

And finally ... giant barred spiral galaxy NGC 6872. It's the largest known spiral galaxy.

The spiral is ~ 522,000 ly across from the tip of one outstretched arm to the tip of the other, which makes it about five times the size of the Milky Way.

IC 4970, the small disk galaxy interacting with NGC 6872, is located above the spiral's central region.

[micropage7]

Originally Posted by Drone

A bunch of pics for today. No worries, only brand new hot and sexy images:

http://www.spacetelescope.org/static.../potw1252a.jpg

The heart of the barred spiral galaxy NGC 1097

http://www.eso.org/public/archives/i...n/eso1302a.jpg

The globular cluster 47 Tucanae

http://www.spacetelescope.org/static.../heic0602a.jpg

Spiral galaxy M101 (the Pinwheel Galaxy)

http://www.spacetelescope.org/static.../potw1301a.jpg

An archetypal dwarf galaxy NGC 5477

http://cdn.physorg.com/newman/gfx/ne...lexreveals.jpg

And finally ... giant barred spiral galaxy NGC 6872. It's the largest known spiral galaxy.

The spiral is ~ 522,000 ly across from the tip of one outstretched arm to the tip of the other, which makes it about five times the size of the Milky Way.

IC 4970, the small disk galaxy interacting with NGC 6872, is located above the spiral's central region.

its beautiful
and it makes me realize how small the world that we live in

[Drone]

NGC 2170

The bluish areas are reflection nebulas, so-named because they reflect the light of nearby stars. The dust particle size in these areas preferentially reflects blue light, similar to cigarette and other kinds of smoke. The red areas are emission nebulas, and shine by a different mechanism. Ultraviolet light from nearby stars excites hydrogen and other gas atoms in the nebula, which then emit light of their own in specific colors. Finally, what looks a bit like black ink spilled across the image constitutes a dark nebula, and is only seen because of the light that it blocks. In other words, the dark nebula is seen in silhouette.

It's so beautiful

[Drone]

Brand new image of Lupus 3 (a dark cloud in the constellation of Scorpius, 600 ly from Earth)

As the denser parts of such clouds contract under the effects of gravity they heat up and start to shine. At first this radiation is blocked by the dusty clouds and can only be observed at longer wavelengths than visible light, such as the infrared. But as the stars get hotter and brighter their intense radiation and stellar winds gradually clear the clouds around them until they emerge in all their glory.

Darkness creates the light. How fascinating.

The bright stars right of the centre of this new picture form a perfect example of a small group of such hot young stars. Some of their brilliant blue light is being scattered off the remaining dust around them. The two brightest stars are bright enough to be seen easily with a small telescope or binoculars. They are young stars that have not yet started to shine by nuclear fusion in their cores and are still surrounded by glowing gas. They are probably less than one million years old.

Toddler stars, that's cute.

[Drone]

New image of clouds of cosmic dust in the region of Orion.



The image shows the region around the reflection nebula NGC 1999 in visible light. While these dense interstellar clouds seem dark and obscured in visible-light observations, APEX’s LABOCA camera can detect the heat glow of the dust and reveal the hiding places where new stars are being formed.

[Drone]

Two brand new eye-catching views the Andromeda Galaxy (M31) from the Herschel space observatory:





It's always great to see new pictures from space!

Andromeda is the nearest major galaxy to our own Milky Way at a distance of 2.5 ly, making it an ideal natural laboratory to study star formation and galaxy evolution.

Sensitive to the far-infrared light from cool dust mixed in with the gas, Herschel seeks out clouds of gas where stars are born. The new image reveals some of the very coldest dust in the galaxy - only a few tens of degrees above absolute zero - colored red in this image.

By comparison, warmer regions such as the densely populated central bulge, home to older stars, take on a blue appearance.

Intricate structure is present throughout the 200000-ly-wide galaxy with star-formation zones organized in spiral arms and at least five concentric rings, interspersed with dark gaps where star formation is absent.

Andromeda is host to several hundred billion stars. Many more stars will soon to spark into existence.

You can download high resolution pics of Andromeda Galaxy below:

http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/tiff/PIA16682.tif

http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/tiff/PIA16681.tif

[Drone]

M106 is a spiral galaxy, located a little over 20 million ly away. At its heart, as in most spiral galaxies, is an active supermassive black hole.



A new sweeping image from NASA's WISE showing the tangle of clouds and stars that lie in Orion's Sword.



Image of NGC 1973, the Running Man Nebula, located roughly 1500 ly from Earth in the constellation of Orion.