Nebula · Cassiopeia

Nébuleuse Pacman

A cloud of ionised hydrogen in Cassiopeia, about 9,500 light-years away and a hundred or so light-years across.

In the catalogue, the thumbnail for this object is cropped in on its subject, so that it can be seen at card size. This view here is the whole photograph, as I produced it.

Its dark notch earned it the nickname of Pacman. The open cluster IC 1590 formed at its centre, and it is what lights it up. Bok globules can also be made out in it, cocoons of dust where stars are born. The gas responds quickly to the dual-band filter. The globules, though, are read in the contrast: it is the exposure time accumulated on the background that carves them out.

Source: Wikipédia en français, NGC 281. A figure wrong? Report it.

38m 1 shot

0 towards 22h 12m · cumulative integration on this object

Temps d'intégration : the total exposure time, the sum of every exposure stacked on an object.