Found Images: 2020 December

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Have you seen a great image or video somewhere that you think would make a great APOD? Nominate it for APOD! Please post as much information here as you have about the image/video with a link to any source(s) for it you know of here, and the editors will take a look.

When posting the image itself, please do not post anything larger than a thumbnail here; please honor the copyright holder's copyright.

Please keep hotlinked images under 500K.

Thank you!

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Dr 24
https://www.imagingdeepspace.com/dr24.html
Copyright: Peter Goodhew
Processing: Marcel Drechsler

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Abell 72
https://www.astrobin.com/3ldmvg/B/
Copyright: Chris Sullivan

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NGC 3109
https://www.rolfolsenastrophotography.c ... /i-8DHhMcj
Copyright: Rolf Olsen

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NGC 3077
https://www.hansonastronomy.com/ngc-3077
Copyright: Mark Hanson

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NGC 1398
https://www.eso.org/public/images/potw1801a/
Copyright: ESO

Click to view full size image

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NGC 1316-7
https://pbase.com/strongmanmike2002/ngc1316_in_fornax
Copyright: Michael Sidonio

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NGC 1333 region
http://www.astrosurf.com/ilizaso/orriak ... Q_U16m.htm
Copyright: Iñaki Lizaso

From top to bottom, the three reflection nebulae to the right of NGC 1333 are vdB12, vdB13 and vdB16.

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Splitting the Sky
ESO Picture of the Week | 2020 Dec 07

Image Credit: Petr Horálek/ESO

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This photograph, taken by ESO Photo Ambassador Petr Horálek, looks west from ESO’s Paranal Observatory in Chile.

The bright object at the centre of the frame is the Moon — slightly to its upper left is the ringed planet Saturn, while rocky Mercury sits to the lower left. Saturn and Mercury in conjunction can be difficult to see with the naked eye from some latitudes, but this breathtaking image captures them beautifully, despite the relatively bright light from the nearby Moon. The dusty Milky Way appears to split the sky horizontally, with a star-studded night view above and the last signs of the Sun lingering below. Many famous nebulae are visible across this cosmic curtain, such as the Lagoon Nebula, Cat’s Paw Nebula, and Trifid Nebula.

The individual telescopes in this image together make up ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), the world’s most advanced optical and infrared observatory. The VLT consists of four large Unit Telescopes, each with a mirror 8.2 metres across, and four smaller Auxiliary Telescopes, with mirrors 1.8 metres in diameter.

[bystander]

The Stellar Forge
ESA Hubble Picture of the Week | 2020 Dec 07

Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, J. Lee; Acknowledgement: Leo Shatz

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An orange glow radiates from the centre of NGC 1792, the heart of this stellar forge. Captured by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, this intimate view of NGC 1792 gives us some insight into this galactic powerhouse. The vast swathes of tell-tale blue seen throughout the galaxy indicate areas that are full of young, hot stars, and it is in the shades of orange, seen nearer the centre, that the older, cooler stars reside.

Nestled in the constellation of Columba (The Dove), NGC 1792 is both a spiral galaxy, and a starburst galaxy. Within starburst galaxies, stars are forming at comparatively exorbitant rates. The rate of star formation can be more than 10 times faster in a starburst galaxy than in the Milky Way. When galaxies have a large resevoir of gas, like NGC 1792, these short lived starburst phases can be sparked by galactic events such as mergers and tidal interactions. One might think that these starburst galaxies would easily consume all of their gas in a large forming event. However, supernova explosions and intense stellar winds produced in these powerful starbursts can inject energy into the gas and disperse it. This halts the star formation before it can completely deplete the galaxy of all its fuel. Scientists are actively working to understand this complex interplay between the dynamics that drive and quench these fierce bursts of star formation.

[barretosmed]

Gassendi A and Gassendi B craters


The surface of the crater is cut by a system of several channels (rille), which give a “fractured” appearance to the floor. This channel system was called Rimae Gassendi. The various channels in the crater floor are the result of volcanic and tectonic forces.
In April 1966, members of the "BAA Lunar Section" (British Astronomical Association - Lunar Section) reported the appearance of a sudden reddish glow in Gassendi. This reddish color was confirmed by several seasoned observers. Thereafter, Gassendi became a hot target for the search for TLP (Transient Lunar Phenomena) - transient, brief or transient lunar phenomenon, which are described as quick appearances of lights, colors or change of appearance in the visual, which could demonstrate the existence of volcanic manifestations, gas escapes or other geological processes that supposedly would imply that the moon would not be geologically dead.

Best details:
https://www.astrobin.com/full/ilwv1w/0/?nc=user


Equipment
MEADE LX200 10 "UHTC
ZWO Optical ASI 462MC
Filter: Planetary Baader L 1.25 "
Accessory: TeleVue Powermate 2.0x
Mount: Ioptron Cem60
Polar alignment: Sharcap
Capture: SharpCap V3.0
Processing: Photoshop CS6 ,, AutoStakkert AutoStackert !, Registax 6.

10/28/2020
São Paulo-SP-Brazil

Copyright: Fernando Oliveira de Menezes
Email: Barretosmed@hotmail.com

Click to view full size image

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MBM 54 and NGC 7497
https://www.myastroscience.com/mbm54
Copyright: Sergio Kaminsky

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Sh2-9 and M4
https://www.astrobin.com/364403/
Copyright: Alberto Pisabarro

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M46 and NGC 2438
http://www.cielaustral.com/galerie/photo119.htm
Copyright: Ciel Austral

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NGC 40 and CTA 1
https://www.astrobin.com/ebxtej/
Copyright: Mark Stiles

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LoTr 1
http://www.chart32.de/index.php/component/k2/item/383
Copyright: CHART32
Processing: Johannes Schedler

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Sandqvist 187-8
http://www.atacama-photographic-observa ... php?id=178
Copyright: Thierry Demange, Richard Galli and Thomas Petit

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FEST 1-7
http://www.astro-austral.cl/imagenes/ne ... 7/info.htm
Copyright: José Joaquin Pérez

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An Otherworldly Glow
ESO Picture of the Week | 2020 Dec 14

Image Credit: Yuri Beletsky (LCO)/ESO

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The antennas comprising the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), in which ESO is a partner, appear to emit an eerie, vivid shade of green light in this Picture of the Week. Situated high up on the isolated Chajnantor plateau in Chile’s Atacama Desert, ALMA seems like the perfect place for friendly extraterrestrials to discreetly land and make contact…but something far more mundane is responsible for this otherworldly green glow. The light emanates from indicator lights, which show whether or not it is safe for staff to approach the antennas. A green light as pictured indicates that it’s safe to approach.

An alien world is, however, visible above the antennas. In the top left of the image, in the clear Chilean sky, two bright stars can be seen next to each other within the band of the Milky Way. These stars are often called The Pointers, as they “point” towards the bright diamond of the Southern Cross (Crux) just to their right. The one nearest to the Southern Cross is Beta Centauri, located some 400 light-years away, and the more distant star is Alpha Centauri, the closest star system to the Sun at a distance of only 4.37 light-years. This system contains the red dwarf star Proxima Centauri; in 2016, astronomers used ESO telescopes to find evidence of an Earth-sized planet orbiting Proxima Centauri in the habitable zone.

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Rings of Relativity
ESA Hubble Picture of the Week | 2020 Dec 14

Image Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, S. Jha

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The narrow galaxy elegantly curving around its spherical companion in this image is a fantastic example of a truly strange and very rare phenomenon. This image, taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, depicts GAL-CLUS-022058s, located in the southern hemisphere constellation of Fornax (The Furnace). GAL-CLUS-022058s is the largest and one of the most complete Einstein rings ever discovered in our Universe. The object has been nicknamed by the Principal Investigator and his team who are studying this Einstein ring as the "Molten Ring", which alludes to its appearance and host constellation.

First theorised to exist by Einstein in his general theory of relativity, this object’s unusual shape can be explained by a process called gravitational lensing, which causes light shining from far away to be bent and pulled by the gravity of an object between its source and the observer. In this case, the light from the background galaxy has been distorted into the curve we see by the gravity of the galaxy cluster sitting in front of it. The near exact alignment of the background galaxy with the central elliptical galaxy of the cluster, seen in the middle of this image, has warped and magnified the image of the background galaxy around itself into an almost perfect ring. The gravity from other galaxies in the cluster is soon to cause additional distortions.

Objects like these are the ideal laboratory in which to research galaxies too faint and distant to otherwise see.

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Sh2-239 and NGC 1555
https://www.astrobin.com/f9z2ho/
Copyright: Toshiya Arai

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NGC 1333
https://www.astrobin.com/w6uycr/C/
Copyright: Tommy Nawratil

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vdB31
https://www.astrobin.com/wgoo78/
Copyright: Nikita Misiura

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NGC 1579
https://www.astrobin.com/cyhwlz/
Copyright: Masahiro Takahashi

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NGC 6366
http://www.capella-observatory.com/Imag ... GC6366.htm
Copyright: Josef Pöpsel, Frank Sackenheim and Stefan Binnewies