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RASC - St. John's Centre |
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| Image of M101 the Pinwheel Galaxy
taken from Mt. Pearl, Newfoundland. Photographed by Dave Newbury - April 18, 2015 |
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Pinwheel Galaxy (M101) in Ursa Major, taken April 18, 2015 @ Mount Pearl, Newfoundland. Equipment - C11 on EQ8, 0.70 LF Corrector/Reducer, Canon 6D (unmodified). Autoguiding using ED80, QHY5LII-mono and PHD2. Images captured with assistance of BackYardEOS, stacked and processed in PixInsight. Stack of 72, 120 second subs @ 6400iso (144min total integration time). This is a great example of a "grand design" spiral galaxy (ie. has clearly defined and well organized spiral structure). It was not until the 1920's that scientists realized these "spiral nebulae" were in fact separate galaxies, much further away from our own Milky Way galaxy. It was also one of the key galaxies used by Edwin Hubble to confirm that the universe is expanding. Click on image for larger photo. |
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M101 the Pinwheel Galaxy contains many H II regions (star forming areas)- some of which have their own NGC #'s. These can be seen in this annotated version of the image. The small galaxy at upper middle edge of frame is PGC49919. Click on image for larger photo. |