M 77 and NGC 1055
Location: Warrumbungle Observatory, Australia (149 11 E, 31 16 S)
Date: Various dates in October 2012
Camera: QHY-9 and QHY filters
Telescope: William Optics M120
Frames: Sixteen 10 minute luminance frames and twelve 300 second exposures for each of RGB.
Processing: Stacked in CCDStack, balanced, curves, highlights, noise reduction and selective sharpening in
Photoshope CS5.
Text adapted from APOD: Large spiral
galaxy NGC 1055 (lower left) joins spiral M77 in this lovely cosmic view toward the constellation Cetus. The
narrowed, dusty appearance of edge-on spiral NGC 1055 contrasts nicely with the face-on view of M77's bright
nucleus and spiral arms. Both over 100,000 light-years across, the pair are dominant members of a small galaxy
group about 60 million light-years away. At that estimated distance, M77 is one of the most remote objects in
Charles Messier's catalog and is separated from fellow island universe NGC 1055 by at least 500,000
light-years.
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