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IC 4703
IC 4703 is the diffuse emission nebula or HII region associated with Messier 16, which is actually a cluster of stars. It is the nebulous region surrounding Messier 16. These two objects make up the Eagle Nebula. They are relatively bright and are located in the constellation Serpens Cauda. This region contains the picturesque Pillars of Creation. This is an active star forming region 7,000 light years away. It is approximately magnitude 8. The cluster was discovered by Jean-Philippe Loys de Cheseaux, but Charles Messier later rediscovered it and remarked on its apparent nebulous appearance. The cluster is estimated to be 5.5 million years old, and the nebula would be a bit older. The nebula is about 55 x 70 light years. The Eagle Nebula lies in the Sagittarius Arm of the Milky Way. References *The Belt of Venus. M16 and IC 4703 - The Eagle Nebula. 9/12/07The Belt of Venus See also *Messier 16 Messier may refer to: People with the surname *Charles Messier, French astronomer ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
J2000
In astronomy, an epoch or reference epoch is a instant, moment in time used as a reference point for some time-varying astronomical quantity. It is useful for the celestial coordinates or orbital elements of a Astronomical object, celestial body, as they are subject to Perturbation (astronomy), perturbations and vary with time. These time-varying astronomical quantities might include, for example, the mean longitude or mean anomaly of a body, the node of its orbit relative to a reference plane, the direction of the apogee or Perihelion and aphelion, aphelion of its orbit, or the size of the major axis of its orbit. The main use of astronomical quantities specified in this way is to calculate other relevant parameters of motion, in order to predict future positions and velocities. The applied tools of the disciplines of celestial mechanics or its subfield orbital mechanics (for predicting orbital paths and positions for bodies in motion under the gravitational effects of other bodi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Emission Nebula
An emission nebula is a nebula formed of ionized gases that emit light of various wavelengths. The most common source of ionization is high-energy ultraviolet photons emitted from a nearby hot star. Among the several different types of emission nebulae are H II regions, in which star formation is taking place and young, massive stars are the source of the ionizing photons; and planetary nebulae, in which a dying star has thrown off its outer layers, with the exposed hot core then ionizing them. General information Usually, a young star will ionize part of the same cloud from which it was born, although only massive, hot stars can release sufficient energy to ionize a significant part of a cloud. In many emission nebulae, an entire cluster of young stars is contributing energy. Stars that are cooler than around 25,000K don't give off enough ultraviolet radiation with wavelengths shorter than 91.2nm (the wavelength needed in order to ionize Hydrogen atoms). This results in the r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Messier 16
Messier may refer to: People with the surname *Charles Messier, French astronomer *Éric Messier, former NHL defenseman *George Messier, French inventor *Jean-Marie Messier, former CEO of Vivendi Universal * Marc Messier, Canadian actor from Quebec *Mark Messier, former NHL player, Hall of fame class 2007 *Paul Arthur Messier, art conservator Other uses *Messier object, a set of 110 astronomical objects *Messier (crater) *Messier (automobile) Messier was a French automobile manufacturer, based at Montrouge, on the southern edge of Paris, from 1925 till 1931.Linz, Schrader: ''Die Internationale Automobil-Enzyklopädie.''Georgano: ''The Beaulieu Encyclopedia of the Automobile.''Georga ..., a French car produced 1925–1931 * Messier-Dowty and preceding companies in manufacture of aircraft undercarriage {{disambiguation, surname French-language surnames ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eagle Nebula
The Eagle Nebula (catalogued as Messier 16 or M16, and as NGC 6611, and also known as the Star Queen Nebula) is a young open cluster of stars in the constellation Serpens, discovered by Jean-Philippe de Cheseaux in 1745–46. Both the "Eagle" and the "Star Queen" refer to visual impressions of the dark silhouette near the center of the nebula, an area made famous as the "Pillars of Creation" imaged by the Hubble Space Telescope. The nebula contains several active star-forming gas and dust regions, including the aforementioned Pillars of Creation. The Eagle Nebula lies in the Sagittarius Arm of the Milky Way. Characteristics The Eagle Nebula is part of a diffuse emission nebula, or H II region, which is catalogued as IC 4703. This region of active current star formation is about 5700 light-years distant. A spire of gas that can be seen coming off the nebula in the northeastern part is approximately 9.5 light-years or about 90 trillion kilometers long. The cluster associated wit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Serpens
Serpens ( grc, , , the Serpent) is a constellation in the northern celestial hemisphere. One of the 48 constellations listed by the 2nd-century astronomer Ptolemy, it remains one of the 88 modern constellations designated by the International Astronomical Union. It is unique among the modern constellations in being split into two non-contiguous parts, Serpens Caput (Serpent Head) to the west and Serpens Cauda (Serpent Tail) to the east. Between these two halves lies the constellation of Ophiuchus, the "Serpent-Bearer". In figurative representations, the body of the serpent is represented as passing behind Ophiuchus between Mu Serpentis in ''Serpens Caput'' and Nu Serpentis in ''Serpens Cauda''. The brightest star in Serpens is the red giant star Alpha Serpentis, or Unukalhai, in Serpens Caput, with an apparent magnitude of 2.63. Also located in Serpens Caput are the naked-eye globular cluster Messier 5 and the naked-eye variables R Serpentis and Tau4 Serpentis. Notable ext ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pillars Of Creation
''Pillars of Creation'' is a photograph taken by the Hubble Space Telescope of elephant trunks of interstellar gas and dust in the Eagle Nebula, in the Serpens constellation, some from Earth. These elephant trunks had been discovered by John Charles Duncan in 1920 on a plate made with the Mount Wilson Observatory 60-inch telescope. They are named so because the gas and dust are in the process of creating new stars, while also being eroded by the light from nearby stars that have recently formed.Embryonic Stars Emerge from Interstellar "Eggs" Hubble news release Taken on April 1, 1995, it was named one of the top ten photographs from Hubble by ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Light Years
A light-year, alternatively spelled light year, is a large unit of length used to express astronomical distances and is equivalent to about 9.46 trillion kilometers (), or 5.88 trillion miles ().One trillion here is taken to be 1012 (one million million, or billion in long scale). As defined by the International Astronomical Union (IAU), a light-year is the distance that light travels in a vacuum in one Julian year (365.25 days). Because it includes the time-measurement word "year", the term ''light-year'' is sometimes misinterpreted as a unit of time. The ''light-year'' is most often used when expressing distances to stars and other distances on a galactic scale, especially in non-specialist contexts and popular science publications. The unit most commonly used in professional astronomy is the parsec (symbol: pc, about 3.26 light-years) which derives from astrometry; it is the distance at which one astronomical unit subtends an angle of one second of arc. Defini ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jean-Philippe Loys De Cheseaux
Jean-Philippe Loys de Cheseaux (; 4 May 1718 – 30 November 1751) was a Swiss astronomer. Biography Loys de Cheseaux was born on 4 May 1718 in Lausanne, Vaud, to Paul-Etienne Loys de Cheseaux, a banneret, and Estienne-Judith de Crousaz. His brother was Charles-Louis Loys de Cheseaux. He was educated by his maternal grandfather, the mathematician and philosopher Jean-Pierre de Crousaz, and wrote his first essays, under the title ''Essais de Physique'', in 1735, aged 17. In 1736, Loys de Cheseaux installed an observatory in his father's lands in Cheseaux-sur-Lausanne. He acquired a reputation in Europe as an astronomer with the publication of his ''Traité de la Comète'', in 1744, a treatise on his observations of the comet C/1743 X1 in which he also became one of the first to state, in its modern form, what would later be known as Olbers' paradox (that, if the universe is infinite, the night sky should be bright). After his discovery of C/1743 (along with Dirk Klinkenberg ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Charles Messier
Charles Messier (; 26 June 1730 – 12 April 1817) was a French astronomer. He published an astronomical catalogue consisting of 110 nebulae and star clusters, which came to be known as the ''Messier objects''. Messier's purpose for the catalogue was to help astronomical observers distinguish between permanent and transient visually diffuse objects in the sky. Biography Messier was born in Badonviller in the Lorraine region of France, the tenth of twelve children of Françoise B. Grandblaise and Nicolas Messier, a Court usher. Six of his brothers and sisters died while young, and his father died in 1741. Charles' interest in astronomy was stimulated by the appearance of the great six-tailed comet in 1744 and by an annular solar eclipse visible from his hometown on 25 July 1748. In 1751, Messier entered the employ of Joseph Nicolas Delisle, the astronomer of the French Navy, who instructed him to keep careful records of his observations. Messier's first doc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sagittarius Arm
Sagittarius ( ) may refer to: *Sagittarius (constellation) *Sagittarius (astrology), a sign of the Zodiac Ships *'' SuperStar Sagittarius'', a cruise ship * USS ''Sagittarius'' (AKN-2), a World War II US Navy cargo ship Music *Sagittarius (band), an American sunshine pop studio group * Ensemble Sagittarius, an ensemble conducted by Michel Laplénie Fictional characters *Sagittarius (comics), member of Zodiac, an evil group in the Marvel Universe *Sagittarius Aiolos, a character in ''Saint Seiya'' *Sagittarius, a ''Fairy Tail'' character Zoology *''Sagittarius serpentarius'' or secretarybird, a large, mostly terrestrial bird of prey *''Sibynophis sagittarius'', a species of snake found in South Asia Other uses *Sagittarii, Ancient Roman archers *Sagittario or Sagittarius, a Beyblade toy See also *Sagittarius Dwarf Galaxy (other) * * *Sagitta (other) *''Sagittaria ''Sagittaria'' is a genus of about 30 [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Milky Way
The Milky Way is the galaxy that includes our Solar System, with the name describing the galaxy's appearance from Earth: a hazy band of light seen in the night sky formed from stars that cannot be individually distinguished by the naked eye. The term ''Milky Way'' is a translation of the Latin ', from the Greek ('), meaning "milky circle". From Earth, the Milky Way appears as a band because its disk-shaped structure is viewed from within. Galileo Galilei first resolved the band of light into individual stars with his telescope in 1610. Until the early 1920s, most astronomers thought that the Milky Way contained all the stars in the Universe. Following the 1920 Great Debate between the astronomers Harlow Shapley and Heber Curtis, observations by Edwin Hubble showed that the Milky Way is just one of many galaxies. The Milky Way is a barred spiral galaxy with an estimated D25 isophotal diameter of , but only about 1,000 light years thick at the spiral arms (more at the bulg ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
