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#StarCluster

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The globular star cluster Messier 13 earlier tonight. Result of 3600 0.1-sec images made with my phone and (non-tracking) 20 cm f/3.8 telescope, combined in Siril and the background and color touched up in Gimp. Conditions at my moderately light-polluted site were okay but not great; transparency was poor. The colors of the stars in the image are subtle, just enough to tell the yellowish Red Giant Branch stars from the bluer Horizontal Branch and upper Main Sequence stars.

I don't talk about astronomy nearly enough, so let's change that!

One of the most groundbreaking developments in astronomy has been the absolutely mind-blowing work the James Webb Space Telescope has been putting out in a fraction of the time it took the old Hubble Space Telescope to produce similar work. Here are a couple of recent images I find particularly remarkable.

S1 LMC N79 – Dorado

Honestly, this image is just beautiful to look at. It’s even more breathtaking when you consider that this is just one cloud within this star-forming region of the Large Magellanic Cloud, which itself is an irregular galaxy located about 163,000 light-years from Earth. If you live in the Southern Hemisphere and find yourself a suitably dark place, you can gaze up and see this whole other galaxy as a milky blotch in the night sky.

You can read more about this image here.

A gravitationally lensed supernova in MRG-M0138 – Cetus

It's pretty wild seeing the immense force of gravity contained within these galactic clusters warp distant points of light in these visually striking ways. Each arc is a galaxy far beyond the cluster itself that allow us to peer further back in time. Sometimes these warped images mirror themselves on the complete opposite side of the cluster, like ripples on a pond. In the case of this distant supernova, the light emanating from that cataclysmic event is being reflected in such a way that it's reappearing further down the length of the arc, making it seem as though there are two supernovae happening when in fact they are the same.

You can read more about this image here.

Continued thread

Stars were bright points instead of comet-like blurs. I was even able to see M13 — the grand globular #starcluster in #Hercules — though between #lightpollution and atmospheric haze, the view was low contrast but filled the field of view; I can hardly wait for better seeing! I tore down for the night happy to have the old C11 performing well and ready for some cosmic exploration. #C11 #collimation #M13 #venus #astronomy