I imaged this supernova remnant from my back garden on the 15th January 2024, using my one shot colour camera, my skywatcher telescope and my light pollution filter and my Skywatcher HEQ5 Pro telescope mount.
Total Integration time: 12 hours
Moon coverage: 60%
Location: Northern Hemisphere
Bortle: 4
The Crab nebula or Messier 1:
The Crab Nebula is a supernova remnant and pulsar wind nebula in the constellation of Taurus. The common for this supernova remnant comes from a drawing that resembled a crab with arms produced by William Parsons, 3rd Earl of Rosse, in 1842 or 1843 using a 36-inch telescope. Source Wikipedia
The Crab Nebula is an expanding remnant of a star's supernova explosion. Japanese and Chinese astronomers recorded this violent event nearly 1,000 years ago in 1054 AD, as likely did the Native Americans. The glowing relic has been expanding since the star exploded, and it is now approximately 11 light-years in width.
Here are some things about the crab nebula that you may not have known:
The crab nebula is one of the brightest radio sources in the sky, and at the heart of it is a very bright and very energetic pulsar. The pulsar is observed across the entire light spectrum, from radio waves to gamma rays. The pulsar generates an extremely powerful wind that interacts with the expanding nebula and generates very intricate and beautiful filaments and you can just about see this in the image I took from my back garden.
The Crab Nebula exploded because a massive star ran out of its fuel and collapsed into a neutron star under immense gravity, then violently ejected its outer layers in a supernova explosion.
The Crab Nebula is one of the most studied remains of a stellar explosion and is widely accepted to be due to a supernova seen in the year 1054 a.d. by Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Arab astronomers, who reported sighting a new bright star in the heavens. The star was so brilliant that it was visible even during the day for nearly three weeks and only faded from view nearly two years later. During that time it was called the Guest star because of its fleeting brightness.
Below is a close crop of my image above and you can see some of the amazing filaments described in the copy above.
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