Starship Asterisk*

Image Location: 25°21' N 100°09' O
Image Description: Cola de Caballo (Spanish for "Horse Tail") is a waterfall about 40 km (25 mi) from Monterrey, Mexico, in the town of Villa de Santiago, Nuevo León. It is open to the public and is accessible via a walking path.
This beautiful waterfall is part of the National Park “Cumbres de Monterrey”. It’s crystal clear waters are precipitated from the height of 25 meters resembling a ponytail surrounded by dense vegetation, has staircases that allow visitors to observe it from different angles with a recreation center.
Copyright: César Cantú

Rolando Ligustri wrote: PSN J12184868+1424435 in M99

link for high res, http://www.astrobin.com/75051/

Rolando Ligustri wrote: comet C/2012 X1 Linear, 28/01/2014, near the open cluster IC4665 and the bright star beta Oph

link for high res, http://www.astrobin.com/75090/

Rolando Ligustri wrote: Comet C/2013 R1 Lovejoy, 28/01/2014, between same beautiful stars

link for high res, http://www.astrobin.com/75118/

Further obscure offerings from the Hubble archive.


ESO 137-1
Someone's losing their gas.
Credit: Hubble Legacy Archive, NASA, ESA; Processing: Judy Schmidt



Supernova Remnant N132D
Glowing eerily through a thick haze of stars.
Credit: Hubble Legacy Archive, NASA, ESA; Processing: Judy Schmidt



NGC 4639
A spiral host to many young stars.
Credit: Hubble Legacy Archive, NASA, ESA; Processing: Judy Schmidt



HH 24 in Infrared
The private life of a newborn.
Credit: Hubble Legacy Archive, NASA, ESA; Processing: Judy Schmidt

The rotation of the Earth captured in the trails of the stars over Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on Jan. 23, 2014 for the launch of NASA's latest Tracking & Data Relay Satellite, TDRS-L, which is seen here hitching a fiery ride to orbit atop an Atlas-V rocket as viewed from the Turn Basin on Kennedy Space Center just a few miles away.

Approximate total shooting time was about 3 hours, 380 exposures combined to create this composite.

Photo Credit: Mike Killian (http://www.MikeKillianPhotography.com) / AmericaSpace (http://www.AmericaSpace.com)

M45. Pleiades.

Canon 550D + TS65.
10x600

Taken in Cañada de la Cruz - Murcia.

© Álvaro Pérez Alonso y Jose Manuel Pérez Alonso.

http://www.meteocaravaca.es

Our FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/perezalonsofotografia

High resolution: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/499 ... ionada.jpg

ΒATTLE UNDER THE STARS by Stavros Hios, on Flickr

Jupiter and the moon Io on January 28th, 03:38ut. The moon Io is transiting across the disk and its trailing shadow behind. Still turbulent conditions and saharra dust aerosols.

M45 over the waterfall.
Credit: César Cantú http://www.astrophoto.com.mx/picture.ph ... category/9

Moon and Venus conjunction on January 29th over the Alps, seen from Mt Blauen (southern Black Forest, Germany)







http://macrosphaere.blogspot.de/2014_01_01_archive.html

WCEN core

Credit: Hubble Legacy Archive, NASA, ESA;

Processing: Sergio Montúfar

NGC1805, The Heart Nebula
Color (R+B) and Luminance data courtesy POSS-II (The Second Palomar Observatory Sky Survey)
Image Assembly and Processing: Oliver Czernetz NGC2264, the Cone Region
Color (R+B) and Luminance data courtesy POSS-II (The Second Palomar Observatory Sky Survey)
Image Assembly and Processing: Oliver Czernetz NGC602 - a young, bright open cluster in the Small Magellanic Cloud
Data from the Hubble Legacy Archive
Image Processing: Oliver Czernetz

Probable Supernova PSN J12184868+1424435 in M99 (NGC 4254, Coma Pinwheel) in Coma Berenices.

http://www.irida-observatory.org

Copyright: [url=mailto://info@irida-observatory.org]Velimir Popov, Emil Ivanov[/url]

CBAT "Transient Object Followup Reports"
PSN J12184868+1424435 in M99
Probable Supernova 2014 in M99, first designated PSN J12184868+1424435, was discovered on 2014/01/26.830 by THU-NAOC Transient Survey (TNTS). Found in M99 at R.A. = 12h18m48s.68, Decl. = +14°24'43".5 (= NGC 4254), Located 14" west and 16" south of the center of M99.

Following the posting on the Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams (CBAT) about a possible Supernova in M99 spiral galaxy (TOCP Designation: PSN J12184868+1424435) we performed follow-up of this object through a 12"RC astrograph + CCD camera from our remote controlled IRIDA Observatory.

Mousehover image


Annotated image:
Thank you for looking ...

http://www.irida-observatory.org/Observ ... tions.html

Copyright: [url=mailto://info@irida-observatory.org]Velimir Popov, Emil Ivanov[/url]

Velimir Popov, Emil Ivanov, that is so interesting!

The probabale supernova is not outstandingly bright. It must be remembered, however, that M99 is a quite bright galaxy.

The supernova, if that is what it is, is also quite reddish. It might be dust-reddened, it might have gone unnoticed for some time (but how likely is that?) or else it might be intrinsically reddish.

I wonder - is it at all possible that this "new light" in M99 might be at all similar to V838 Monocerotis?

Ann

Morning Shades Conjunction
Copyright: Giuseppe Petricca
http://www.gmrphotographer.net/

http://gmrphotographer.net/APOD/DSCN2833_1logo1.jpg Nikon Coolpix P90 on tripod

Ann wrote:Velimir Popov, Emil Ivanov, that is so interesting!

The probabale supernova is not outstandingly bright. It must be remembered, however, that M99 is a quite bright galaxy.

The supernova, if that is what it is, is also quite reddish. It might be dust-reddened, it might have gone unnoticed for some time (but how likely is that?) or else it might be intrinsically reddish.

I wonder - is it at all possible that this "new light" in M99 might be at all similar to V838 Monocerotis?

Ann

Hi Ann,

We can not be sure about the character of this object. It is not yet confirmed as a supernova. We simply use the only possible night during past ten days for imaging M99 following the information from CBAT:

http://www.cbat.eps.harvard.edu/unconf/ ... 24435.html

The authors mentioned that the magnitude of the object on unfiltered CCD was about 17.2 mag. It is not so bright indeed. The object seems to be very close to the central dusty regions of M99 which may cause the star redness.

More investigations from the scientist are needed

Velimir

SN 2014J in M82
URL of website (Hungarian): http://www.radiocluj.ro/blog/messzelato ... z-m82-ben/
Copyright: VNP Above: I combined a picture of mine made on Dec. 28th (37 minutes of light) with the data collected on Jan. 29th (25 minutes, mostly just stars, the SN and the glowing sky). Severe light pollution needed to be cancelled out in both cases. Processed in Iris and DSS. Below is a raw picture for comparison:

This is an image from the Hubble archives that is never published based on this dataset. I really regret this, because I think it's a beautiful set of data with lots of potential. I downloaded the original fits files and used them to generate this Hubble palette image of this area. It reminds me a bit of the famous 'Pillars of creation'.

I started working on this image already 1,5 years ago, but using some new software and experience I could get a bit more of detail out of the image...

NGC 6357 is a diffuse nebula near NGC 6334 in the constellation Scorpius. This nebula was given the name War and Peace Nebula by the Midcourse Space Experiment scientists because of its appearance. They said that in infrared images the bright, western part resembles a dove, while the eastern part looks like a skull. The nebula contains many proto-stars shielded by dark disks of gas, and young stars wrapped in expanding “cocoons”.

This image was made using the following Hubble datasets:
hst_09091_21_wfpc2_f502n_wf
hst_09091_21_wfpc2_f656n_wf
hst_09091_21_wfpc2_f673n_wf
hst_09091_21_wfpc2_f814w_wf
HST_9857_05_ACS_WFC_F660N


NGC 6357 Hubble Space Telescope by Andre vd Hoeven, on Flickr

Superior sky with Aurora Borealis
http://www.hlp.fi
Copyright: Henri Luoma

Oulujärvi, Finland, -20°C and wind blowing from open lake didn't stop me from going out last night with my camera to make timelapses. The clear sky was beautiful with stunning milkyway combined with Aurora Borealis!

http://www.hlp.fi/materiaalit/apod/_98B ... fi-WEB.jpg

Comet C/2013 A1 Siding Spring on January 30th, 00:45 ( 20 min total exp ). Under average conditions and low on the southern horizon and light pollution near by city and saharra dust. A distant Galaxy PGC199572 is close by.

M99 and recently discovered Super Nova. On January 29th, 04:32ut. Messier 99 (also known as M99 or NGC 4254) is an unbarred spiral galaxy approximately 50 million light-years away in the constellation Coma Berenices. ( Equipment: LX200ACF 12 in. OTA, F6.3, ST402me NAB Ccd. 20min exp. )

IO_12 wrote:

Ann wrote:Velimir Popov, Emil Ivanov, that is so interesting!

The probabale supernova is not outstandingly bright. It must be remembered, however, that M99 is a quite bright galaxy.

The supernova, if that is what it is, is also quite reddish. It might be dust-reddened, it might have gone unnoticed for some time (but how likely is that?) or else it might be intrinsically reddish.

I wonder - is it at all possible that this "new light" in M99 might be at all similar to V838 Monocerotis?

Ann

Hi Ann,

We can not be sure about the character of this object. It is not yet confirmed as a supernova. We simply use the only possible night during past ten days for imaging M99 following the information from CBAT:

http://www.cbat.eps.harvard.edu/unconf/ ... 24435.html

The authors mentioned that the magnitude of the object on unfiltered CCD was about 17.2 mag. It is not so bright indeed. The object seems to be very close to the central dusty regions of M99 which may cause the star redness.

More investigations from the scientist are needed

Velimir

Meanwhile, the possible Supernova PSN J12184868+1424435 in M99 received its official designation: SN 2014L and it is a type Ic supernova: Type Ic are categories of stellar explosions that are caused by the core collapse of the star with the apparent lack of helium in the spectra of SNIc.

Link 1: IRIDA Observatory SN 2014L
Link 2: Latest Suparnovae

Velimir
31.01.2014

Sirius (α CMa), The Sun, Betelgeuse (α Orionis)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/m_acubens/12232806426/

by. Sergio Montúfar

sunset - moonrise

taken on January, 10th, 2009 in O Campo, A Lama Council, Pontevedra, Spain.


luna e solpor by Antonio Costa, on Flickr