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