Messier 61

[petevasey]

Although in general this season has been very disappointing the Arctic air high pressure system in early April has continued to provide clear skies albeit with limited imaging time with the approach of twilight nights. Last night (April 12th) was again clear and I was able to capture data for this image. Definitely getting short of sleep!!  But musn't complain 🥱

Messier 61 is a slightly distorted face on mag 9.3 spiral galaxy in Virgo. I have imaged it a couple of times in the past, but it was long overdue for a repeat visit to capture the fainter outer areas. This is one of the largest galaxies in the Virgo cluster and very active with several supernovae observed in recent years. QSI683 with SX AO unit on RC10. Luminance 14 x 10 minutes, RGB each 6 x 10 minutes all binned 2x2. The camera was actually rotated 90 degrees to provide a suitable guide star, so the image is cropped for a more pleasing North up view, and this is the full size image. The medium sized complete image is available here. The other two notable galaxies (from left to right) are mag 12.9 NGC 4301 and mag 12.2 NGC 4292

Cheers,

Peter

 

Edited April 13, 2021 by petevasey