APOD: South of Carina (2020 May 22)

[APOD Robot]

[img]https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/calendar/S_200522.jpg[/img] South of Carina

Explanation: With natal dust clouds in silhouette against glowing atomic gas, this colorful and chaotic vista lies within one of the largest star forming regions in the Milky Way galaxy, the Great Carina Nebula. The telescopic close-up frames a field of view about 80 light-years across, a little south and east of Eta Carinae, the nebula's most energetic and enigmatic star. Captured under suburban skies improved during national restrictions, a composite of narrowband image data was used to create the final image. In it, characteristic emission from the nebula's ionized sulfur, hydrogen, and oxygen atoms is mapped to red, green, and blue hues, a color palette also popular in Hubble Space Telescope images. The celestial landscape of bright ridges of emission bordered by cool, obscuring dust lies about 7,500 light-years away toward the southern constellation Carina.

<< Previous APOD

This Day in APOD

Next APOD >>

[orin stepanek]

This a gonna be another amazing background for my computer
screen! One thing about APOD is there is a never ending
source of great views to show the world! Thanks to all the
astronomical telescopes and scientists that make these photos
available to all!

[neufer]

This a gonna be another amazing background for my computer screen!

I already have it as the foreground for my computer screen...

(...now where did I put that screen cleaner )

[Sa Ji Tario]

Imagine flying between these molecular clouds, I think that in less than two minutes we would be with a skin tone worthy of the French Riviera and we would be confused with the usual Ipanema, but at 10 or 15 more serious as the sirloin on the grill by the amount of UV radiation received. For my part, I will do what Ignacio does, see it from the 7,500 AL and admire the colors poured in its elaboration, then put it as a wallpaper on the monitor, as confessed by what the APOD fellow, Robert Nemiroff, did and how They will make other lovers of the beauties of the southern skies.-
With the "green, red and blue tones" the signatures of the elements of this great molecular cloud are detected, capable of generating massive and modest stars like our sun, in addition to the planets and other components of a respected planetary system. “to the best of my knowledge and belief”

[Sa Ji Tario]

RJN sorry plis

[Ann]

APOD Robot wrote:

Captured under suburban skies improved during national restrictions

Yes, certain catastrophes are good for observational astronomy in that they make the night skies darker.

This reminds me of the accomplishments of brilliant observational astronomer Walter Baade during the blackouts of World War II:

Walter Baade. Photo: Mount Wilson Observatory.

---

Wikipedia wrote about Walter Baade:

He worked at Mount Wilson Observatory from 1931 to 1958. There, during World War II, he took advantage of wartime blackout conditions (which reduced light pollution), to resolve stars in the center of the Andromeda Galaxy for the first time. These observations led him to define distinct "populations" for stars (Population I and Population II). The same observations led him to discover that there are two types of Cepheid variable stars. Using this discovery he recalculated the size of the known universe, doubling the previous calculation made by Hubble in 1929. He announced this finding to considerable astonishment at the 1952 meeting of the International Astronomical Union in Rome.

Martin Ratcliffe wrote in Cosmology and the Evolution of the Universe:

A quiet and thoughtful man whose science was exemplary, Baade used the dark nights atop Mount Wilson during the blackout periods of World War II. His German origin made him technically an enemy alien, and he was restricted to living in the Los Angeles area. This gave Baade practically unlimited use of the 100-inch telescope.

All the American astronomers were called in for military service, which is why Baade had the 100-inch Mount Wilson telescope all to himself. Sometimes it is good to suffer a private semi-lockdown during darkened conditions.

Ann

[MarkBour]

... Walter Baade during the blackouts of World War II
... Sometimes it is good to suffer a private semi-lockdown during darkened conditions.

Ann

Fascinating! The best astronomers seem to have taken every opportunity and stretched it to maximum effect.

[neufer]

Baade is a lunar impact crater

---

Fermat's spiral is an efficient layout for the mirrors of concentrated solar power plants.

---

Baade is a 55 km wide lunar impact crater that is located near the southwest limb of the Moon on the near side, to the southwest of the enormous Mare Orientale impact basin. The area to the east of this crater forms the junction between the 280-km-long Vallis Bouvard to the north and the narrower, 160-km-long Vallis Baade to the south-southeast. Both valleys radiate away from the impact basin to the north.

The outer wall of Baade remains sharp-edged, with little appearance of erosion due to subsequent impacts. The rim is generally circular, with some terracing of the inner wall. The crater interior is rough and irregular, with a generally bowl-shaped appearance that lacks a sharply defined floor. There is no central peak at the midpoint of the interior, and no craterlets of note mark the surface.

[neufer]

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

---

<<944 Hidalgo is a centaur and unusual object on an eccentric, cometary-like orbit between the asteroid belt and the outer Solar System, approximately 52 kilometers in diameter. Discovered by German astronomer Walter Baade in 1920, it is the first member of the dynamical class of centaurs ever to be discovered. The dark D-type object has a rotation period of 10.1 hours and likely an elongated shape. It was named after Mexican revolutionary Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla (1753–1811), who was responsible for declaring Mexico's independence in 1810. Hidalgo was discovered by German astronomer Walter Baade on 31 October 1920 at Bergedorf Observatory in Hamburg, Germany. German astronomers who were in Mexico to observe a total eclipse on 10 September 1923 had an audience with President Álvaro Obregón. During this meeting, they asked his permission to name the asteroid after Hidalgo (AN 221, 159 from 1924).

[TheZuke!]

Yes, certain catastrophes are good for observational astronomy in that they make the night skies darker.

This reminds me of the accomplishments of brilliant observational astronomer Walter Baade during the blackouts of World War II:

Ann

He sounds like "one Baade Dude!"