Galaxy Hopping in Ursa Major

Having just returned from the European Astrofest I obviously hadn't had enough Astronomy for the day, as a bright crystal clear sky beckoned for an extended observing session. The night was fairly mild and with no set plan I started hunting galaxies in Ursa Major. As the seeing conditions were  good  I thought I'd have a go at re-imaging the Twin Quasar - it had been a year since I last saw it, and I wondered which of the Twin's components "A" or  "B"  would now be brightest.




4x40 sec exposures revealed the above image which reveals the quasar nicely resolved. It looked as though both components were equally as bright this time  - for earlier images have a look here. Not far  from the Twin lies an intriguing galaxy NGC 2685. This is quite possibly a colliding pair of galaxies since the host galaxy appears to have a polar ring completely encircling it. This is a difficult object to image, however the ring is just beginning to appear as this image shows (4x40 sec exposure):



Moving back to the bowl of the big dipper,  from beta Ursa Majoris I star hopped to the galaxy M108 which is just a degree north west of the Owl Nebula - one of the largest planetary nebulae. This image reveals the two large dark "cavities" in the expanding gas shell. It is a 4x40 sec exposure. The Owl lies at a distance of 3000 light years and is probably 3 light years in diameter. The star at the centre is slightly brighter than our own sun - what a sobering thought!

Messier  97 "The Owl Nebula"



Messier 108

This cigar shaped galaxy was discovered in 1781 by Paul Mechain. It is 7.8' x 1.4' in size at mag 10.8 and displays a mottled surface, which can be seen visually through the telescope.




A final target for tonight was the fine spiral NGC 3953. This is a tenth mag loosely bound spiral galaxy about 7x3.5 arc minutes in size. I misadvertently thought I was imaging M109 another fine loose armed spiral only a few degrees distant. Also caught in this image is a faint anonymous galaxy just to the right - which  isn't listed in any of my catalogues and it certainly wasn't a comet.

NGC 3953

Worth Hill Observatory Index