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Herschel 400 Catalogue
The Herschel 400 catalogue is a subset of William Herschel, William Herschel's original ''Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars'', selected by Brenda F. Guzman (Branchett), Lydel Guzman, Paul Jones, James Morrison, Peggy Taylor and Sara Saey of the Ancient City Astronomy Club in St. Augustine, Florida, United States c. 1980. They decided to generate the list after reading a letter published in Sky and telescope, ''Sky & Telescope'' by James Mullaney of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. In this letter Mr. Mullaney suggested that William Herschel's original catalogue of 2,500 objects would be an excellent basis for deep sky object selection for amateur astronomers looking for a challenge after completing the Messier Catalogue. The Herschel 400 is a subset of John Herschel's ''General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters'' published in 1864 of 5,000 objects, and hence also of the ''New General Catalogue''. The catalogue forms the basis of thAstronomical Leagu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Herschel
Frederick William Herschel (; german: Friedrich Wilhelm Herschel; 15 November 1738 – 25 August 1822) was a German-born British astronomer and composer. He frequently collaborated with his younger sister and fellow astronomer Caroline Herschel (1750–1848). Born in the Electorate of Hanover, William Herschel followed his father into the military band of Hanover, before emigrating to Great Britain in 1757 at the age of nineteen. Herschel constructed his first large telescope in 1774, after which he spent nine years carrying out sky surveys to investigate double stars. Herschel published catalogues of nebulae in 1802 (2,500 objects) and in 1820 (5,000 objects). The resolving power of the Herschel telescopes revealed that many objects called nebulae in the Messier catalogue were actually clusters of stars. On 13 March 1781 while making observations he made note of a new object in the constellation of Gemini. This would, after several weeks of verification and consultation ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
NGC 2548
Messier 48 or M48, also known as NGC 2548, is an open cluster of stars in the equatorial constellation of Hydra. It sits near Hydra's westernmost limit with Monoceros, about to the east and slightly south of Hydra's brightest star, Alphard. This grouping was discovered by Charles Messier in 1771, but there is no cluster precisely where Messier indicated; he made an error, as he did with M47. The value that he gave for the right ascension matches, however, his declination is off by five degrees. Credit for discovery is sometimes given instead to Caroline Herschel in 1783. Her nephew John Herschel described it as, "a superb cluster which fills the whole field; stars of 9th and 10th to the 13th magnitude – and none below, but the whole ground of the sky on which it stands is singularly dotted over with infinitely minute points". M48 is visible to the naked eye under good atmospheric conditions. The brightest member is the star HIP 40348 at visual magnitude 8.3. The cluster is ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
NGC 205
Messier 110, or M110, also known as NGC 205, is a dwarf elliptical galaxy that is a satellite of the Andromeda Galaxy in the Local Group. Early observational history Charles Messier never included the galaxy in his list, but it was depicted by him, together with M32, on his drawing of "Nébuleuse D'Andromède", later known as the Andromeda Galaxy. A label of the drawing indicates that Messier first saw the object in 1773. M110 was independently discovered by Caroline Herschel on August 27, 1783; her brother William Herschel described her discovery in 1785. From p. 262: "There is a very considerable, broad, pretty faint, small nebula near it he Andromeda galaxy, M31 my Sister arolinediscovered it August 27, 1783, with a Newtonian 2-feet sweeper. It shews the same faint colour with the great one, and is, no doubt, in the neighborhood of it. It is not 32… ; but this is about two-thirds of a degree north preceding it, in a line parallel to β etaand ν uAndromedae." The su ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
NGC 3992
Messier 109 (also known as NGC 3992) is a barred spiral galaxy exhibiting a weak inner ring structure around the central bar approximately away in the northern constellation Ursa Major. M109 can be seen south-east of the star Phecda (γ UMa, Gamma Ursa Majoris). History Messier 109 was discovered by Pierre Méchain in 1781. Two years later Charles Messier catalogued the object, as an appended object to his publication. Between the 1920s through the 1950s, it was considered that Messier objects over 103 were not official, but later the additions, further referred target objects from Méchain, became more widely accepted. David H. Levy mentions the modern 110 object catalog while Sir Patrick Moore places the limit at 104 objects but has M105 to 109 listed as addenda. By the late 1970s all 110 objects are commonly used among astronomers and remain so. General information In March 1956 came M109's sole event-observed supernova, 1956A. It was a type Ia supernova in the south-east pa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
NGC 3556
Messier 108 (also known as NGC 3556, nicknamed the Surfboard Galaxy) is a barred spiral galaxy about 28 million light-years away from Earth in the northern constellation Ursa Major. It was discovered by Pierre Méchain in 1781 or 1782. From the Earth, this galaxy is seen almost edge-on. This galaxy is an isolated member of the Ursa Major Cluster of galaxies in the local supercluster. It has a morphological classification of type SBbc in the de Vaucouleurs system, which means it is a barred spiral galaxy with somewhat loosely wound arms. The maximum angular size of the galaxy in the optical band is 11 ′.1 × 4′.6, and it is inclined 75° to the line of sight. This galaxy has an estimated mass of 125 billion solar masses () and bears about 290 ± 80 globular clusters. Examination of the distribution of neutral hydrogen in this galaxy shows discrete shells of expanding gas extending for several kiloparsecs, known as H1 supershells. These may be driven by currents of dark matte ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
NGC 6171
NGC commonly refers to: * New General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars, a catalogue of deep sky objects in astronomy NGC may also refer to: Companies * NGC Corporation, name of US electric company Dynegy, Inc. from 1995 to 1998 * National Gas Company of Trinidad and Tobago, state-owned natural gas company in Trinidad and Tobago * National Grid plc, a former name of National Grid Electricity Transmission plc, the operator of the British electricity transmission system * Northrop Grumman Corporation, aerospace and defense conglomerate formed from the merger of Northrop Corporation and Grumman Corporation in 1994 * Numismatic Guaranty Corporation, coin certification company in the United States Other uses * National Gallery of Canada, art gallery founded in 1880 in Ottawa, Canada * National Geographic, documentary and reality television channel established in the United States in 2001 formerly called National Geographic Channel * Native Girls Code, US non-profit organisat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
NGC 4258
Messier 106 (also known as NGC 4258) is an intermediate spiral galaxy in the constellation Canes Venatici. It was discovered by Pierre Méchain in 1781. M106 is at a distance of about 22 to 25 million light-years away from Earth. M106 contains an active nucleus classified as a Type 2 Seyfert, and the presence of a central supermassive black hole has been demonstrated from radio-wavelength observations of the rotation of a disk of molecular gas orbiting within the inner light-year around the black hole. NGC 4217 is a possible companion galaxy of Messier 106. A Type II supernova was observed in M106 in May 2014. Characteristics M106 has a water vapor megamaser (the equivalent of a laser operating in microwave instead of visible light and on a galactic scale) that is seen by the 22-GHz line of ortho-H2O that evidences dense and warm molecular gas. Water masers are useful for observing nuclear accretion disks in active galaxies. The water masers in M106 enabled the first cas ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
NGC 3379
Messier 105 or M105, also known as NGC 3379, is an elliptical galaxy 36.6 million light-years away in the equatorial constellation of Leo. It is the biggest elliptical galaxy in the Messier catalogue that is not in the Virgo cluster. It was discovered by Pierre Méchain in 1781, just a few days after he discovered the nearby galaxies Messier 95 and Messier 96. This galaxy is one of a few not object-verified by Messier so omitted in the editions of his Catalogue of his era. It was appended when Helen S. Hogg found a letter by Méchain locating and describing this object which matched those aspects under its first-published name, NGC 3379. It has a morphological classification of E1, indicating a standard elliptical galaxy with a flattening of 10%. The major axis is aligned along a position angle of 71°. Isophotes of the galaxy are near perfect ellipses, twisting no more than 5° out of alignment, with changes in ellipticity of no more than 0.06. There is no fine structur ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
NGC 4594
The Sombrero Galaxy (also known as Messier Object 104, M104 or NGC 4594) is a peculiar galaxy of unclear classification in the constellation borders of Virgo and Corvus, being about from the Milky Way galaxy. It is a member of the Virgo II Groups, a series of galaxies and galaxy clusters strung out from the southern edge of the Virgo Supercluster. It has a diameter of approximately , three-tenths the size of the Milky Way. It has a bright nucleus, an unusually large central bulge, and a prominent dust lane in its outer disk, which is viewed almost edge-on. The dark dust lane and the bulge give it the appearance of a sombrero hat (thus the name). Astronomers initially thought the halo was small and light, indicative of a spiral galaxy; but the Spitzer Space Telescope found that the dust ring was larger and more massive than previously thought, indicative of a giant elliptical galaxy. The galaxy has an apparent magnitude of +8.0, making it easily visible with amateur telescope ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
NGC 5866
NGC 5866 (also called the Spindle Galaxy or Messier 102) is a relatively bright lenticular galaxy in the constellation Draco. NGC 5866 was most likely discovered by Pierre Méchain or Charles Messier in 1781, and independently found by William Herschel in 1788. Measured orbital velocities of its globular cluster system imply that dark matter makes up only 34±45% of the mass within 5 effective radii, a notable paucity. Dust lane One of the most outstanding features of NGC 5866 is the extended dust disk, which is seen almost exactly edge-on. This dust lane is highly unusual for a lenticular galaxy. The dust in most lenticular galaxies is generally found only near the nucleus and generally follows the light profile of the galaxies' bulges. This dust disk may contain a ring-like structure, although the shape of this structure is difficult to determine given the edge-on orientation of the galaxy. It is also possible that the galaxy is a spiral galaxy that was misclassified as a len ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
NGC 4548
Messier 91 (also known as NGC 4548 or M91) is a barred spiral galaxy that is found in the south of Coma Berenices. It is in the local supercluster and is part of the Virgo Cluster of galaxies. It is about 63 million light-years away from our galaxy. It was the last of a group of eight "nebulae" – the term 'galaxy' only coming into use for these objects once it was realized in the 20th century that they were extragalactic – discovered by Charles Messier in 1781. It is the faintest object in the Messier catalog. Because of a bookkeeping error by Messier, M91 was for a long time one of the few missing entries in the Messier catalog, not matching any known object in the sky. It was not until 1969 that amateur astronomer William C. WilliamsWilliam C. WilliamsLetter Sky and Telescope, December 1969, p. 376. Accessed 13 April 2011 realized that M91 was NGC 4548,Students for the Exploration and Development of Spac Accessed online 14 April 2011 which was catalogued by William ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
NGC 3034
Messier 82 (also known as NGC 3034, Cigar Galaxy or M82) is a starburst galaxy approximately 12 million light-years away in the constellation Ursa Major. It is the second-largest member of the M81 Group, with the D25 isophotal diameter of . It is about five times more luminous than the Milky Way and its central region is about one hundred times more luminous. The starburst activity is thought to have been triggered by interaction with neighboring galaxy M81. As one of the closest starburst galaxies to Earth, M82 is the prototypical example of this galaxy type. SN 2014J, a type Ia supernova, was discovered in the galaxy on 21 January 2014. In 2014, in studying M82, scientists discovered the brightest pulsar yet known, designated M82 X-2. Discovery M82, with M81, was discovered by Johann Elert Bode in 1774; he described it as a "nebulous patch", this one about degree away from the other, "very pale and of elongated shape". In 1779, Pierre Méchain independently rediscovered ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
.jpg "Click for more on -> NGC 4594")
