Also a huge molecular cloud and 9 asteroids -- no waiting.

I took this with some nasty moonlight in December. I had only two clear nights, one with haze and one with moonlight. Nothing like trying for the really faint stuff with the moon out there. It added gradients to the image making it hard to tell moonlight from nebula. I hope I processed this right. Some shots of the molecular cloud show it blue as you'd expect from a reflection nebula. Its muddy reddish brown in my shot. In fact it barely shows on the blue images except on the western side. It was much stronger in red and green light. I suppose a haze moved in that absorbed all by blue without me realizing it. I'd planned on getting at least one or two more nights of data but the clouds had other ideas. I didn't process it until now. Its now so far west it is in my lake fog zone so I'll have to wait until next year to try again.

Not looking at the data for over two months I now find one of the 9 asteroids in the image is unknown. Considering some 383,912 known ones it's pretty rare to find an unknown. What with the clouds I'd not have been able to follow up on it for enough data to determine an orbit anyway. Still I do need to check these over right away it seems for these guys. This shot is only about 3 degrees from the ecliptic so prime territory for asteroids. Still I've shot many other things near the ecliptic and not done this well! My previous record was 5 in one shot so I've nearly doubled my old record. The magnitudes per the Minor Planet Center's predictions were:
1999 RN53 18.0
2001 TF8 17.9
1993 FD47 19.7
2005 GW218 19.9
2007 VY238 20.1
1999 TL15 19.8
2003 QU94 19.2
2000 GM77 19.8

For those new to asteroids the naming system works this way:
First comes the year of discovery, The first letter tells when in the year it was found A is the first 15 days of January, B the rest of the month, C the first 15 days of February, etc. Except I is skipped. Nor is it used for the second letter either.

The first asteroid discovered in the first half of January 2008 would be 2008 AA, The second 2008 AB, then 2008 AC etc. After 25 have been named letters run out so they start over with 2008 AA1 then 2008 AB1 then 2008 AC1 etc. So we can tell 2007 VY238 was discovered in the first half of November, 2007 and was the 5975th asteroid found that month (25x238+24). That's a lot of asteroids to find in 15 days! Patrol cameras designed for this task account for virtually all of these. Finding one on one of my images that covers less than one quarter square degree of sky is darned rare. Still this is the second. The other was found the hazy night in December but that was a week before this shot and I was unable to find it again. I need a wider field if clouds are going to block me for a week or longer.

The image was taken binned 3x3 using 27 micron pixels to capture the faint light of the background molecular cloud. The bright star is T Tauri. This is a very very young star. So young it is not yet converting hydrogen to helium for its energy. Instead most of the energy comes from gravitational collapse. Same as how air is heated when you compress it with a compressor. In this case gravity is the compressor that's generating the heat. Eventually it will get hot and the core dense enough for fusion to begin. The star is surrounded by dust clouds it formed out of. Also, its light varies just because it is so unstable as yet. The combination of shadows from the dust and its variable nature cause the nebula to vary as different parts of it are illuminated at different levels over time. Hence the name Hind's Variable Nebula Also in the sky in winter but on the other side of Orion is Hubble's Variable Nebula. I try to take it each year hoping to see differences. So far the clouds have thwarted me this winter.

Eventually, once its nuclear furnace ignite T Tauri may provide enough ultra violet light to illuminate its birth place molecular cloud causing it to glow pink with Hydrogen Alpha/Beta light. For now it seems to show a very muddy reddish brown color. I've seen shots of this that show it blue. It barely showed in my blue frame except on the very western edge and for NGC 1555 Hind's Variable Nebula. Maybe some haze moved in and absorbed the faint blue light. Or it got lost in the moonlight? Though my earlier attempt to bring out the cloud taken at 1x1 binning showed it only in red and green light as well with no hint of it in blue. Anyone who knows the answer please let me know.

14" LX200R, L=7x10', RGB=2x10', STL=11000XM, Paramount ME

I've posted it twice, the second identifies the asteroids.

Rick

Attached Images

	ngc1555L7X10X3RGB2X10X3-1.jpg (137.7 KB, 58 views)
	ngc1555L7X10X3RGB2X10X3-1_ID.jpg (143.0 KB, 50 views)

Very Impressive Rick, Lots of asterods capture in one area plus the nebula makes it very beautiful. And thanks for the great info and presentation.

Rick
Your photos are beautiful

One advantage, or disadvantage, depending on the perspective, of a large aperture scope, is the capability to capture low magnitude background objects. You really caught a lot of stuff on this one. That region would make an interesting wide field shot.

Robert

What a huge amount of information packed into a single shot. Thanks for the variable explanation as I had never heard of or considered this stage of star development. Your work is always informative as well as beautiful.

Kind regards
Matt

Great Shot. I love the asteroids

Great detail in those dark clouds!

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Observatorio de la Ballona