The Crab Nebula

Deep Image with Crossed Polarizers

Super Nova Remnant in Taurus

Uploaded 1/15/11

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This unusual image is the result of long exposures in the Red, Blue, Green normally, Hydrogen Alpha 3nm, and a separate set of exposures on the inner continuum radiation with RGB and polarizers crossed 120 degrees for each color. The result is an inner region that is mapped in polarization according to color. The outer filaments are primarily HII and OIII regions and have no polarization.The Object:

The Crab Nebula in Taurus is a super nova remnant that exploded in in the year 1084AD and has been rapidly expanding ever since. It is located a degree from the easternmost star in the Bulls horns, and glows dimly at a magnitude of 8.4. While small at 6 arc minutes, it is typical of the size of many galaxies in my telescope, and thus made a good target for my galaxy hydrogen enhancement technique. Look carefully at the lower left of this image, you will see a passing asteroid Anahita. It was 12.2 magnitude at this time, and was the 270th asteroid ever found.

Instrument: 12.5" f/5 Home made Newtonian Mount: Astrophysics 1200 QMD CCD Camera: SBIG 10XME NABG with Enhanced Water Cooling Guider: Meade DSI Pro w/Lumicon Newt Easy Guider Exposure: LRGB = Ha+RGB = 170:40:40:40 + Polarized RGB = 20:20:20 AstroDon RGB Combine Ratio: 1: 1.05: 1.2 Location: Payson, Arizona, Elevation: 5150 ft. Sky: Seeing FWHM = 5 arcsec (Maxim DL - 10min subframe), Transparency 9/10 Outside Temperature: 35 F CCD Temperature: -30 C Image Processing Tools: Maxim DL: Calibration, deblooming (Starizona Debloomer), aligning, stacking PixInsight: Curves, Deconvolution Photoshop CS2: Curves, Color Correction, Gradient removal (Grad Xterminator), Cleanup HOME GALAXIES EMISSION NEBS REFLECTION NEBS COMETS GLOBULARS OPEN CLUST PLANETARIES LINKS