47 Tuc - NGC104

[hjw]

Hello fellow nightowls...

I haven't been able to post any of my efforts in weeks. Melbourne just went through the wettest winter and the days suitable for AP were few and far in between . Anyway, last night while waiting for the Tarantula nebula to rise above the tree line I decided to give 47 Tuc (NGC104) a go. To cite Wikipedia, 47 Tuc is the second brightest globular cluster (after omega centauri) and some 16000 light years away in the constellation of Tucana - right next to the Small Magellanic Cloud. The cluster itself contains millions of stars and has an exceptionally dense core. Stars in the cluster were extensively searched for the presence of exo-planets and none were found.

To the image itself: about 1.5 hours of 4 min exposures ISO800 and 6 dark frames. The final image was resampled to 50% image size and cropped to 1920x1080. The fuzzy spot on the left is NGC121, another, much smaller globular cluster. The fuzzy spot on the right is not mentioned in Stellarium - so no idea.

Thanks for looking and clear skies!

HJ

[philj]

Very nice image. You think you have weather problems  youre lucky you don't get our weather.

47 Tuc fascinates me Ive only imaged it remotely via Sidings Springs robotic scopes.  

[Yamez]

Fantastic, I am a huge fan of globular clusters and that image is beautiful. Well captured.

[Nova2000]

Superb image. Like the detail. This is the first globular cluster which I saw on the books and always dream to see it bit unfortunately have to go to lower latitudes. Clear skies! 

[hjw]

I thank you all for your kind comments. After my post last night I was curious on how dense the cluster would be: It's hard to find information on the number of stars inside the cluster. The NASA website mentions "several" million. The cluster itself is 120 light years across or just over 900,000 cubic light years in size. The average star density therefore is "several" stars per cubic light year. The density in the core would be easily 10x higher than on the outskirts giving the core a density of hundreds of stars per cubic light year - scary!

Just a fascinating thought...

Clear skies!

HJ

[Mr Spock]

Great looking image.

Lovely thing it is - I only wish we could see it from here!

[Nova2000]

Hjw

On my book it said it's very huge dense and it can be seen naked eyed. Have you seen it? 

[MattJenko]

What a monster!

[hjw]

2 hours ago, Nova2000 said:

Hjw

On my book it said it's very huge dense and it can be seen naked eyed. Have you seen it? 

I am fortunate to be far enough from Melbourne (with a small mountain range in between) to have fairly dark skies. And yes, on a clear night, you can see it with the naked eye. Mind you, only the core... You can also see the Magellanic clouds with a surface brightness of 13.9 and 47 Tuc has a surface brightness of 10.3. I grew up in Germany and had my first telescope there. The southern sky in comparison is unbelievable :).

[PatrickGilliland]

Nice to see an image from the other side - nice sharp stars, good work.

Paddy

[Barry-Wilson]

Great cluster image hjw.

On my monitor the background has a uniform strong blue cast - if you could adjust that you'd have a very striking image.

[Ruud]

Wow, it's wonderful! Thanks for a splendid image. Just amazing.