Stardust around 47 Arietis
Published 13 Dec 2020
About this object
The image above is an area in Aries full of molecular dust. It seems to be rarely imaged as I've only found 1 image of it online. The bright star near center is 47 Arietis a mag 5.8 star in Aries. Dust fills the image with brighter concentrations of it near center and along the bottom. A neat feature just above and to the left of the star seems to me to look like a dragon's head. The wings are spread out in either direction from the star. Maybe a good name for this is the dragon nebula. It also looks like an eagle but that name is already taken. :)). The dust is very faint and on a single sub exposure not much is seen except a hint of the dragon's head. Many exposures stacked, however, reveals the dust. The image is comprised of a bit over 11hrs of sub exposures taken during the late summer through late fall from my backyard observatory. Other than the dust there are few other objects in the image. A few very faint mag 16.9 PGC galaxies are along the left edge and a few more faint and un-named galaxies near them. Along the lower 1/3d of the image the thicker dust is cataloged as LDN 1454, LDN 1458, and LDN 1453. This entire lower 1/3d is also cataloged as MBM 13 or IREC 229. I couldn't find any catalog references for the dusty area near 47 Arietis and above and thats maybe just because the surveys didn't extend into that area or the extent of the cataloged area is a bit small.
The image above is an area in Aries full of molecular dust. It seems to be rarely imaged as I've only found 1 image of it online. The bright star near center is 47 Arietis a mag 5.8 star in Aries. Dust fills the image with brighter concentrations of it near center and along the bottom. A neat feature just above and to the left of the star seems to me to look like a dragon's head. The wings are spread out in either direction from the star. Maybe a good name for this is the dragon nebula. It also looks like an eagle but that name is already taken. :)). The dust is very faint and on a single sub exposure not much is seen except a hint of the dragon's head. Many exposures stacked, however, reveals the dust. The image is comprised of a bit over 11hrs of sub exposures taken during the late summer through late fall from my backyard observatory. Other than the dust there are few other objects in the image. A few very faint mag 16.9 PGC galaxies are along the left edge and a few more faint and un-named galaxies near them. Along the lower 1/3d of the image the thicker dust is cataloged as LDN 1454, LDN 1458, and LDN 1453. This entire lower 1/3d is also cataloged as MBM 13 or IREC 229. I couldn't find any catalog references for the dusty area near 47 Arietis and above and thats maybe just because the surveys didn't extend into that area or the extent of the cataloged area is a bit small.
Image Details
- Optics : Stellarvue SVX 152 refractor @f8 1200mm FL
- Mount: Paramount MYT
- Camera: ZWO ASI6200
- Filters: Chroma 50mm LRGB
- Exposure (min): LRGB 204:156:169:149 11.2hrs, 2x2 binning
- Camera/Mount Control: The Sky X, Voyager
- Guiding: StarlightXpress Lodestar X2
- Processing: PixInsight 1.8,
- Location: Stark Bayou Observatory, Ocean Springs, MS
- Sky: Typical SQM 19.6-20.1, Bortle 5, Suburban
- Date: 18 Aug-15 Nov 2020
