Out again last night to get images on some more star clusters using the telescope. The rest of this week I'll be setting up the camera for catching “shooting stars” (the Perseid meteor shower will peck on the night of August 12 and the morning of August 13).
This first image is Messier 6, also known as the Butterfly Cluster. This is an open star cluster located about 1,600 light-years from our Earth in the southern constellation of Scorpius. This cluster has about 80 whitish or blue-white 1/5
spread out to a diameter of 25 light-years. At an estimated distance of 980 light-years from our Earth, this corresponds to an apparent diameter of 80 arc minutes, more than twice the apparent size of the full Moon.
Both Messier 6 and Messier 7 are near each other and can be seen by the unaided eye but the use of binoculars and/or telescopes helps in seeing the details of the star clusters.
The third image cannot be seen by the unaided eye or binoculars.
This third image is NGC 6453 3/5
(the small reddish haze at the centre in the image), a globular cluster located approximately 37,000 light-years from our Earth, but only about 3,260 light-years from the center of our galaxy. Viewed from our Earth, this cluster is only 7.6' arc minutes in size. For reference, the full moon is 30' arc minutes in size. The brightest stars in this cluster are no brighter than 14th magnitude.
NGC 6453 is located just to the right of Messier 7. 4/5
TClarkIII