The Christmas Tree Cluster - Christmas 2023

 

NGC2264 The Christmas Tree Open Star Cluster in the Constellation Monoceros the Unicorn - telescope.org The Open University Observatory Mount Teide Tenerife. The COAST telescope with BVR and H alpha filters. Image Credit Pip Stakkert.

" A very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all our readers around the World from our Sponsors George and Anita Roberts, our CEO: Joel Cairo our current Director: Kurt Thrust and all the team at the Jodrell Plank Observatory. Lets hope for better weather and clearer skies in Lowestoft in 2024". - Kurt Thrust

Auroral glow over Oulton Broad Suffolk.

 

Auroral Glow over the Jodrell Plank Observatory 22nd November 2023. Canon 600d DSLR with Sigma EX lens at f=20mm. Cropped and stacked image. Credit Kurt Thrust.

"As the Sun moves towards solar maximum the unexpected sight of the Aurora glowing in the Suffolk night sky was once again captured over the Observatory. Not as spectacular as some of the images published on the internet recently but more than pleasing for the staff here at the Observatory in Lowestoft". - Kurt Thrust current Director of the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

Jupiter 03_11_2023 close to opposition but through cloud

 

Jupiter showing 3 moons left to right: Europa, Ganymede and Io.

Jupiter showing two moons: Europa and Ganymede.

Jupiter's disc showing its cloudy atmosphere with two equatorial bands clearly displayed.
North is up in our image.

" Our Instrumentation Engineer, Jolene McSquint Fleming, has been working very hard on the electrical systems at the Jodrell Plank Observatory and today power has been restored. Kurt has yet to reprogramme the LVST software defined radio telescope but has taken the opportunity to download data whilst the telescope has been off-line. Friend of the Observatory, Professor Chrissy H Roberts, has provided invaluable AI advice and time, which may well help to streamline the meteor data analysis process.

The weather took a turn for the better and on 03-11-2023 we were able to rig a temporary electrical supply to the NEQ6Pro mount and capture some Jupiter data using the Meade 127mm apo refractor, x3 Televue Barlow lens and the new QHY5111462c planetary video camera. The last image shown above is the clearest and is a 50% stack of 6000 frames subsequently processed using PIPP, AS3!, Registax6, AstroSharp, AstroClean and AffinityPhoto .2" - Joel Cairo CEO of the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

This image was from a stack of the last video clip of the night. (60% of 3000 frames) The high level cloud had dissipated and the atmosphere was at its most stable. Probably the best image of the evening with reasonable detail showing in the equatorial bands and zones. North is up. Credit: Pip Stakkert. 

Storm Babet.

 

"As the direct result of water ingress associated with the rain and high winds, experienced in Lowestoft during Storm Babet, the power supply to the Jodrell Plank Observatory and the Cabine du Jardin Deux has had to be turned off and isolated. Our site engineer, Jolene McSquint-Fleming, has been working today to restore the power but of course safety is our prime directive in this matter. With the LVST (Lowestoft Very Small Telescope) also off line we are taking the opportunity to download over a year of meteor data collected by the 'software defined radio telescope'". - Joel Cairo CEO of the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

NGC1499 the whole deal

 

Following on from the image  posted of part of NGC1499 , we used data from the old 'Cluster camera' on Mount Teide-Tenerife  (part of the then Bradford Robotic Telescope) and added infra red data from the WISE infra-red space telescope, to  produce this dusty and Ha enhanced image  of the full California Nebula. Credits: telescope.org Open Observatories, Astrometry net, NASA/JPL and Pip Stakkert.

" This emission nebula is large and often pops up in our widefield images of the area of sky encompassing the constellations Perseus and Taurus. It stretches 2.5 degrees across the sky and is about 100 light years across. It is approximately 1000 light years away in the constellation Perseus.  For an idea of scale the Moon which is less than 250,000 miles distant has an apparent diameter of only 0.5 degrees. The California Nebula glows red as the hydrogen gas is excited by the ultra violet light from the nearby star Menkib (Xi Persei)" - Karl Segin outreach coordinator at the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

Credit: Astrometry. net

Widefield image taken from the Jodrell Plank Observatory, showing the California Nebula top left and the Pleiades bottom right.

NGC 1499 or part thereof.

 

Part of the California Nebula. Data credit: COAST robotic telescope telescope.org Open Observatories, Astrometry.net, WISE Infra-red space telescope NASA/JPL. Credit for image processing Pip Stakkert.

 "We have only ever captured the California Nebula in widefield images but as the weather has precluded imaging from Lowestoft, we used data from the COAST robotic telescope on Mount Teide Tenerife and added infra red data from the WISE infra-red space telescope to  produce this dusty and Ha, S11 and O111 enhanced image of just one part of the nebula". -  Karl Segin outreach officer at the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

NGC1300 A barred spiral galaxy in the constellation Eridanus

NGC1300. Data credit PIRATE robotic telescope on Mount Teide Tenerife, telescope.org, Open Observatories, Open University. Filters BVR. Image credit Pip Stakkert.

 " This month, we directed the Robotic Telescope  features" - Kurt Thrust current Director of the Jodrell Plank Observatory

Credit: Hubble Space Telescope NASA

to capture data for the barred spiral galaxy NGC1300 to see if we could detect the aftermath of the supernova that  occurred in this galaxy in 2022. We could not find any bright stars where they shouldn't be so we concluded that the supernova has faded to a magnitude below the depth of the exposure. We have however included a HST image of this spectacular galaxy which highlights its

"Bold and beautiful, NGC 1300 is a marvellous example of a barred spiral galaxy. Unlike in other spiral galaxies where the starry arms curl outward from the centre of the galaxy, NGC 1300's arms twist away from the ends of a straight bar of stars that stretches across the galaxy's core. Observational evidence suggests that our own galaxy, the Milky Way, is a barred spiral as well.

NGC 1300's spiral arms include blue clusters of young stars, pink clouds that are forming new stars, and dark lanes of dust. Two prominent dust lanes also cut through the galaxy's bar, which contains mostly older, orangish stars. These dust lanes disappear into a tight spiral feature at the centre of the bar. Interestingly, only galaxies with large bars appear to have such a "spiral within a spiral." Hubble's image of NGC 1300, taken with the Advanced Camera for Surveys, reveals finer details in these features than ever seen before". NASA

Supernova AT 2022acko in NGC1300 discovered on the 6th of December 2022. A type 11P supernova Image Credit: DLT40 (USA) rochesterastronomy.org

Our image with the supernova from 2022 superimposed.

Messier109 , NGC3992 - A barred spiral Galaxy in the Constellation Ursa Major - The Great Bear.

 

Messier109, telescope.org Open Science Laboratories, Open University, COAST Robotic telescope with BVR filters on Mount Teide

Location chart credit: Astrometry.net

" I am fond of 'barred galaxies like Messier109 over 65 light years distant in Ursa Major. By all accounts our home galaxy, The Milky Way, is a barred galaxy and must look very much like M109 if viewed from a planet orbiting a star in M109. I love it when life becomes  'a serpent eating its own tail'" - Joel Cairo CEO of the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

The Saturn's Rings are closing up, an orbital, perspective and alignment effect.

 

Images captured in 2017 and 2023, 5 years apart, using the 127mm Meade apo refractor , x3 Televue Barlow and two generations of QHY planetary CMOS video cameras. Credit Kurt Thrust and Pip Stakkert.

" The planet Saturn takes 29.5  Earth years to complete one orbit of the Sun. Saturn's axis of rotation is inclined at an angle 26.7 degrees to its orbital plane around the Sun. The visible rings occupy  the planets equatorial plane and from our point of view we cross this plane every 13 to 15 years. Saturn's equinoxes, when the Sun passes through the plane of the rings, are not equally spaced in time. On each and every orbit, the Sun is south of the ring plane for 13.5 years and north for 15.2 years. The images of Saturn taken five years apart as shown above, demonstrate the apparent closing of the rings as viewed from Earth. The images show the south polar region inclined towards the Sun. In 2025 we will see the rings edge on and after that the north polar region will become increasing inclined towards the Sun. I can remember seeing the rings approaching edge on through the eyepiece back in the 19990s prior the opening of the Jodrell Plank Observatory. This time around we will try to gets some images of the equinox".- Kurt Thrust current Director of the Jodrell Plank Observatory

 

Animation credit: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Tdadamemd

This is an animation of the 28 images of Saturn shown in Saturnoppositions.jpg (simulated views using a computer program written by Tom Ruen). This animation demonstrates the 29.5-year orbital period of Saturn by opposition date, as well as the dramatic changes in the orientation of the planet's ring disk. The ring system revolves around a fixed axis, so both sides of the ring disk are visible from Earth during each period in which Saturn orbits the Sun.

The centre of the Milky Way Galaxy and the constellation Sagittarius

 

Images taken with the Bradford Autonomous Telescope
 in 2015 Credit for data processing Pip Stakkert.  Image
below the central section of the image above.

The location of Sagittarius A* has been highlighted by
the white circle overlaid the above image. 

"The centre of the Milky Way is never visible from the Jodrell Plank Observatory so this data from the Bradford Robotic Telescope on Mount Teide is a way by which we can showcase the centre of our home galaxy. It is thrilling to think that somewhere in the area highlighted lurks a massive blackhole with a mass equivalent to 4million solar masses".- Kurt Thrust current Director of the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

Messier 8 The Lagoon Nebula in the constellation Sagittarius

 

Messier 8 - data credit: PIRATE robotic telescope Mount Teide telescope.org Open Science Observatories Open University. Image processing credit Pip Stakkert at the Jodrell Plank Observatory

"Messier 8 never rises high enough at our location in the UK for us to use our large refractor to observe or image this interesting astronomical object. The data for this image was obtained some years ago when we could use the internet to point the large 24 inch PIRATE robotic telescope on Mount Teide at targets we selected in Lowestoft. Pristine unpolluted skies, an excellent camera and a large aperture telescope certainly pay dividends when it comes to astrophotography. Pip has been able to apply modern AI based software to process this old data and obtain the best image possible from it.

  The Lagoon  Nebula is a stellar nursery in which dark clouds of gravitationally collapsing molecular gas and dust ,'Bok Globules', can be seen. Within these cocoon like clouds multiple star systems are being born.  M8 is estimated to be between 4000 and 6000 light years distant and covers an area of sky some 100 x 50 light years in extent. M8 is designated an emission nebula  and has a bright HII (ionised Hydrogen gas molecular cloud) at its centre shown orange in our image. The young open star cluster NGC6530 may be seen to the left of the HII region".- Kurt Thrust current Director of the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

A crop enlargement taken from the M8 image to show a Bok Globule

The Crab Nebula - Messier 1 in the Constellation Cancer

 

The Crab Nebula - HSO narrow band palette- Open University, telescope.org COAST robotic telescope. Credit Pip Stakkert Jodrell Plank Observatory

"In 1014 a large star ran out of  hydrogen gas to fuse at its core. Up until this point the outward pressure created by the nuclear fusion balanced the inward gravitational force. A catastrophic collapse occurred with a resultant explosion in a Type 11 supernova! The mass of the star at collapse was too great to have formed a 'white dwarf' star but insufficient to have created a black hole. At the centre of the Crab Nebula there is a rotating 'neutron star' called a 'Pulsar'. The above image is composed from light captured by the robotic camera-telescope combination using three separate filters, which relate to the wavelength of ionised elements - Hydrogen Alpha (656nm), Sulphur II (672nm) and Oxygen III (501nm). The image is therefore of some scientific value in identifying where these excited atoms are located within the supernova debris. In the  HSO palette; excited hydrogen atoms are shown red coloured, Sulphur shown green and Oxygen shown blue.

Hubble Space Telescope image of the centre of the Crab Nebula. the rightmost of the two bright stars at the centre of the image is the pulsar. Credit:NASA and ESA; Acknowledgment: J. Hester (ASU) and M. Weisskopf (NASA/MSFC

The Nebula is 6500 light years distant and sits within the Perseus arm of the Milky Way. It is not possible to see it with the naked eye but it is said that it may be seen with binoculars from a dark location. I however, have never been able to see it other than through a telescope eyepiece. The Crab Nebula is approximately 11 light years across and is expanding at a rate of 1,500 km per second. By comparison the pulsar at its centre has a diameter of at most 30 km. Messier 1 is a very bright source of Gamma Rays, X rays and Radio waves and the pulsar at its centre was the first to be discovered by Dr Susan Jocelyn Bell" - Kurt Thrust current Director of the Jodrell Plank Observatory..

Messier 3 in the constellation Canes Venatici

The Globular Star Cluster Messier3 - 127mm Meade Apo refractor and Canon 600d DSLR. A cropped stack of 30 second sub frames. Credit Kurt Thrust at the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

 " Sadly and over the past few days, the Observatory Team has been laid low by the Covid virus. However, on a positive note , Pip Stakkert has risen from his sick bed to upgrade some of the processing software used here at Jodrell Plank. He is a particularly plucky and persistent processor indeed!

Pip has installed the latest iteration of AstroSharp, which now installs with AstroClean. Initial tests on the above image of Messsier3 have shown a big improvement over the original image.

Also, good friend of the Observatory, Professor Chrissy H Roberts, has applied some AI magic to our processing 'schstick' which improved the colour and number of stars visible in the above image. 

We are already to go and catch some night time photons with both kit and software primed for action. We just need the Covid virus to burn itself out and the weather to be astro-imaging friendly.

Messier 3 is an absolutely splendid globular star cluster some 32600 lightyears from Earth and roughly the same distance above the disc of the galactic plane of the Milky Way. It is estimated to be over 11 billion years old and contains approximately 500,000 stars. It is relatively bright and can be seen as an unresolved cloud through binoculars. To resolve stars requires a telescope with an aperture in excess of 100mm. To provide scale, the brightly illuminated dense core in our image is approximately 11 light years in diameter. The average spectral type of the primarily ancient stars that make up this cluster is F2 so its stars would be expected to present, much like our Sun, as yellow in colour. From close inspection of the above image, you will note that there are a number of blue stars present within the cluster. You are no doubt aware that only giant and short lived stars shine blue. So how can there be blue stars in a 11billion year old globular cluster? It is thought that mass transfer between older cooler stars, that get too close for comfort in the star dense cores of globular clusters, can rejuvenate and reinvent themselves as blue giants. These are referred to as 'blue stragglers'.

Messier3 may be seen roughly halfway between the bright alpha stars Arcturus and Cor Coroli." - Joel Cairo CEO of the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

Credit for map Roberto Mura, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

 

The white dwarf star at the centre of Messier27 the Dumbell Planetary Nebula

 

Cropped image from a stack captured with the Jodrell Plank Observatory's 127mm Meade Apo refractor and a 600d Canon DSLR. Credit:Kurt Thrust.

Annotated image credit: Astrometry.net

" Planetary nebulae have nothing to do with planets! Indeed they should remind us that everything in the Universe, you, me, the Observatory cat Comet and stars have finite lives. Stars, even the biggest, hottest and most short lived have lives measured in millions if not billions of years but eventually everything comes to an end.

To explain what is happening in the above image. Approximately 10,000 years ago, a medium sized star not unlike our Sun, ran out of fuel, expanded and started pulsating losing gas as it went. Over time this gas, affected by the stars magnetic field, expanded in two cone like lobes in opposing directions The nebula we see from Earth is side on with one lobe to the left and one to the right in our image. The gas shown in red is ionized hydrogen, that shown in blue is doubly ionized oxygen.

Stars are enormous balls of gas, which over time collapse under the effect of gravity until the very central core becomes so compressed and hot such that nuclear fusion of hydrogen commences. The nuclear furnace at a stars core creates an outward pressure which balances the inward pressure of gravity and all is well and 'hunky-dory'!

The larger the star the hotter it is and at higher temperatures the faster nuclear fusion consumes the hydrogen fuel. Large hot stars have shorter lives than smaller cooler stars because they use their larger reserves of fuel much much faster than their smaller cousins. 

A star's end game, when fusion can no longer provide sufficient outward pressure to resist gravity, is is only dependant upon  mass at the point of collapse.

Stars happily fusing hydrogen to create helium, and maintaining equilibrium with gravity, are said to be on the 'main-sequence'

Very cool and tiny stars, having masses less than 0.08 that of the Sun, known as brown dwarfs, never become main-sequence stars.

Stars with a mass less than 1.4 times the mass of our Sun will, after leaving the main-sequence, first expand to form cool red giants. Over time these stars will pulsate ejecting outer layers of gas. The envelope of gas becomes separated from the core. This thin shell expands and cools creating a planetary nebula.  The very hot core sits at the centre of the  planetary nebula shining for millions of years solely by the radiation of heat. The material in a white dwarf no longer undergoes fusion reactions, so the star has no source of energy. Consequently, it cannot support itself by the heat generated from fusion against gravitational collapse, but is supported only by electron degeneracy pressure, causing it to be extremely dense. In the far distant future, our Sun will expand to create a planetary nebula and a white dwarf star.

Stars with a mass between 1.4 and 3 times the mass of our Sun continue to contract under the force of gravity which overcomes the outward pressure created by electron degeneracy. The material continues to compress until the protons and electrons are squeezed into neutrons. Above a certain density and pressure, the neutrons are subject to quantum laws and become a degenerate gas. The gas has sufficient pressure to withstand the gravitational force and equilibrium is achieved. A Neutron star is thus formed.

When stars with a mass in excess of 3 solar masses run out of fuel to fuse, there is an enormous explosion, which is called a 'supernova'. Depending upon how much mass is lost in the process the core collapses to form a 'neutron star' or a 'black hole'. 

Most stuff in space spins and stars are no exception. Anything that collapses inwards and has a rotational spin, speeds up as it collapses. Neutron stars that spin are called 'pulsars'. It is thought that as many as 10% of white dwarf stars have strong magnetic fields associated with spin and density".-  Karl Segin outreach coordinator at the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

Digital processing or data reduction as it was called in the olden days.

 

Re-processed Messier 35 widefield Credit: Pip Stakkert

"Pip Stakkert decided to rework the data for this image we previously published. The original showed too many stars with pixelated shapes. 

Stars represent quite a challenge for astro-photographers. Nebulae and extended objects are much easier to image and represent. Stars are big, very big or enormous but all, other than the Sun, are far far away. As a consequence of their extreme distance, they should present as point sources of light of varying degrees of brightness and colour. Unfortunately, when the light from a star passes through a lens, be it on a telescope a camera or the ones in your eyes, the point source becomes a small disc. This is a physical and unavoidable feature of light and lenses! The colour, which is determined by the stars temperature, migrates to the edge of the disc leaving the brighter centre pure white and often saturated. To capture faint objects the astrophotographer primarily increases the length of exposures and consequently brighter stars are over exposed and colour is lost. Your eye and brain combination, may not be able to detect the light from faint objects that are easy for the cameras sensor to register, but working together  can compose a more coherent and dynamic view of the night sky. Getting the stars to look 'natural' in a widefield image requires the data processor to decide how many stars to show, how to ensure their disc shape is circular, how to differentiate between bright and dimmer stars and how much colour to display.

The new neural network based software StarFixer is an interesting development and is likely to improve over time. At the moment we use it in combination with other software in regulating the shape of stars. The new astrophotography V15 macros developed by James Ritson for Affinity Photo 2.0.0 are astoundingly good at rendering stars in a realistic and natural way.

The open cluster Messier35 is much clearer in this image version as is the fainter open cluster, NGC2158, to its immediate south west. Overall the image, fewer stars are on display and there is a bigger dynamic range between the dimmest and brightest stars. In a nutshell, this image of stars looks less busy, is a better representation of what the eye brain combination might see if it was more sensitive at low light levels and more naturalistic all round (excuse the pun)". - Kurt Thrust current Director of the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

StarFixer AI software

M31,M32 and M110

Antares and M4

Constellation Auriga widefield

Globular star cluster M15 widefield

 "All the above images were reprocessed using StarFixer artificial intelligence based software as a part of the data reduction process.. Thanks Filippo for letting us trial your excellent software".  - Joel Cairo CEO of the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

https://www.starfixer.org/

The Galaxy Messier87 in the constellation Virgo

 

Top left, super giant elliptical galaxy Messier 87 plus lots of ionised interstellar gas and dark dust on show in this stacked image captured with the Observatory's Canon 600d DSLR  on a Star Adventurer EQ mount. The images were taken at ISO800 and f=35mm. Credit: Pip Stakkert.

"The data for this image has been archived for some time and when Pip set about processing it he noticed that the shape of many of the stars was elongated rather than the theoretical point they should present as. This can happen for a number of reasons, which include: inaccurate polar alignment of the EQ mount, inaccurate tracking, optical defects and atmospheric issues. 

Some of these 'Slivers' of light were indeed galaxies, a long way away and viewed edge on, but some actual stars appeared elliptical. As you can imagine elliptical stars would not do for our Pip. Indeed this problem was giving Pip 'sleepless nights'!

The excellent Professor Morison in his equally excellent 'Astronomy Digest', brought our attention to some AI based software 'StarFixer' currently being trialled on line. The above image is the result of applying 'StarFixer' to our data. All the Team at the Jodrell Plank Observatory thought this software delivered a considerable improvement.

I nice feature of this image is the two smudges of cojoined light bottom left, which are the gravitationally interacting spiral galaxies NGC4567 and NGC4568 , which are also known as the Butterfly Galaxies.

I really like this image as every tiny smudge of light you can see represents millions if not trillions of stars over 60 million light years distant. Just think for a moment. Light travels at approximately 300 million metres per second or 671million miles per hour! So distances measured in light travelling for millions of years are enormous beyond comprehension!". - Kurt Thrust current Director of the Jodrell Plank Observatory

The Helix Nebula in the constellation Aquarius

 

The Helix planetary nebula. Data from the PIRATE robotic telescope Mount Teide, Open University. telescope.org. Infra red data added from the NASA WISE space telescope. Data processed by Kurt Thrust

"Also known as 'The Eye of Sauron', the Helix planetary nebula is the remnant from a star that has run out of fuel to fuse and collapsed by gravity to create a white dwarf star and expanding clouds of dust and ionized gas. A white dwarf star is the very hot core of a star which was once roughly the size of our Sun. The Helix Nebula is 655 light years from the Earth and as such is one of the closest planetary nebula.

In the very centre of the nebula you can see the white dwarf star shining brightly and losing heat". - Karl Segin outreach officer at the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

The Ringed Planet at Opposition

 

Saturn and four moons imaged in the early hours 04-09-2023 with 127mm Meade Apo refractor, x3 Televue Barlow and a QHY5III462 colour planetary camera. Credit Pip Stakkert.

"After the jet stream departed from over Lowestoft, the night sky has been subject to mist and a blanket of wispy high level cloud. As Saturn is just about accessible, over the top of Mr Shrodinger's olive tree with the pier mounted 127mm Apo Meade refractor, we decided to have a go at imaging it with a  Televue x3 Barlow and the new QHY5III462 planetary camera. The image is a bit soft but Pipp managed to sharpen it a little and dig four moons out of the mist. Processed with PIPP, AS!3, Registax6, Affinity Photo2,.Astrosharp, Fitswork4 and Topaz Denoise AI software". - Joel Cairo CEO of the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

The Double Cluster in Widefield Wonder

 

A stack of RAW lights captured with the Jodrell Plank Observatory's Canon 600d DSLR with EOS zoom lens at f=90mm ISO1600 on a Star Adventurer EQ mount. Infra-red data was added from the WISE space telescope to increase the dynamic range of the final image. Credit: Pip Stakkert, NASA and Astrometry.net.

Area of sky covered by the image; Credit Astrometry.net

"The Double Cluster in the constellation Perseus are two open star clusters, NGC869 and NGC884, seen side by side in the night sky as viewed from the Northern Hemisphere. There are more than 300 blue-white super-giant stars in each of these clusters. The clusters are very young at 14 million years old and are much younger than the Pleiades. They are some 7500 light years distant in the Perseus arm of the Milky Way. The clusters may be seen with the naked eye from a dark location but come to life when viewed through binoculars or a telescope at low magnification. The glowing gas and dust associated with the Heart and Soul and Fishhead nebulae show up well in the infra-red data from the WISE telescope and can be seen as the red bobs centre top in our image" - Kurt Thrust current Director of the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

Messier35 or NGC2168 in the Constellation Gemini

 

Messier35 is a rather splendid binocular open star cluster in the constellation Gemini the twins. Widefield image taken with the Canon 600d DSLR and zoom lens at f=50mm. A stack of RAW lights at ISO1600.Infra-red data was added to the base image from the WISE space telescope Image credit: Pip Stakkert, NASA and Astrometry.net

" The majority of data used in creating this image was collected at the Jodrell Plank Observatory. Sadly the atmosphere ,which keeps us all alive, is largely opaque to mid infra-red radiation, which originates from hot interstellar gas and dust. The NASA's WISE space telescope sits above the atmosphere in low earth orbit and collects radiation at this wavelength. Pip Stakkert has used his image processing skills to add this data to ours and create this interesting combined image with a high dynamic range.

The cluster is 2900 light years distant and thought to include over 1600 stars distributed over part of the sky with an apparent size equivalent to the full Moon. Within a central volume of  approximate diameter equivalent to thirty arc seconds, there are over 400 stars 64 of which are binary pairs. There are a number of variable stars within the cluster and one star's spectrum shows emission lines. Messier 35 is 175 million years old, a relative youngster in the night sky. Another star cluster, but much further away (line of sight proximity only) NGC2158, is just south and west of M35". - Kurt Thrust current Director of the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

This is the Jodrell Plank data without the added infra-red WISE data. By comparison you can see how the infra-red adds to the dynamic range of the image! 

Location map showing the footprint of our image. You can see that M35 sits at the feet of Gemini and between Auriga, Orion and Taurus.

WISE space telescope (NASA)