Abell 79 (HOO) - A data mining result

[Yoddha]

Digging in my database of source images created by APT, I have found that there are several objects which I didn’t process at all. This one is a quite old – imaged in September-October 2021…

Abell 79 ("The 6 Nebula") is a planetary nebula with an unusual shape. It is located in the Lacerta constellation at a distance between 3600 and 5800 ly from Earth and is expanding at 12.5 km/s. The central white dwarf is very weak 18m and according to the known information is too cool to ionize the surrounding gas in the observed levels. So, it is supposed that there is, a not found yet, hot companion that can do that. Maybe the interaction between these two is the reason for the strange arcs which by the way are mainly from hydrogen. Interestingly the object is described to have strong emission in NII (stronger than Ha and OIII together), however I don’t have such filter to explore it Also didn’t manage to find any image of it in that part of the spectrum… In fact, Abell 79 is very rarely imaged and maybe it will not sound very modest, but this is one of the deepest images made recently (up to 2023).

The object is well placed in Autumn and you still can give it a try this season 😉

Total 22h 10min in 4 nights - Ha (66x600s), OIII (67x600s),  RC250 @ f/5.5, ASI2600MM, CEM60, Astrodon 3nm filters
Acquisition : APT - Astro Photography Tool, PHD2
Processing: PixInsight, PS