Joe Mize is at it again! He has a habit of sending links about fascinating objects that are just too interesting to ignore (even if there is a million other subjects to violate!) This afternoon he sent a link (first link below) to a very cool mouse-over composite image of satellite x-ray/radio data superimposed on optical data involving one of the most active galaxy nuclei (M106) in Canes Venatici. Lots of professional effort has been spent over the recent years trying to decipher the nature of the peculiar astrophysical jet(s) and “anomalous” arms of M106. So it is apropos to ask if the Chiefland Village has participated in this M106 nucleus imagingfest – the answer is “yes”, despite no specific hydrogen alpha data being collected! These M106 images (wide & nucleus mosaic) are strictly LRGB data with no H-a data, although all the other pro data in the numerous attached links below leans heavily on narrowband, IR, x-ray and radio wavelengths. I’ll bet Joe is going to rip this object with H-alpha and NII imaging with his Hyperion like a pro. Meantime, notice the myriads of tiny anonymous galaxies to the right of M106 in the wide shot as well as the star birth region (red) within adjacent galaxy NGC 4248! I created an RGB “movie” showing the jet projecting prominently only in the red filter data which corresponds beautifully to the jet seen in the Chandra and NASA data.
There has been a supernova discovered in the gorgeous Canes Venatici galaxy M106 – 24 million light years distant. It was discovered by a PanSTARRS telescope May 20, 2014 and is now called SN 2014bc. One of the interesting aspects of this supernova is that it lies immediately adjacent to the galaxy nucleus (1 arcsec to the east)! I searched the net for visual sightings of this SN but found none. I did find a post on “Cloudy Nights” forums by observing stud Mike Harvey (link below) who did not find it visually nor image it in his Mallincam! I used astro-processing software CCDStack to ferret the SN out from the nucleus using a DDP technique in the image above, 3.5 hour LRGB exposure using the 14.5-inch RCOS and Apogee camera at Chiefland May 23. Also visible in the SN 2014bc image is the integral-shaped ‘astrophysical jet’ that courses through the nucleus. The mosaic above was prepared in 2009 and also shows this active nucleus galaxy phenomenon. My long list of objects to shoot includes capturing 15 – 20 hours of H-alpha data on this jet to enhance my LRGB image. So much to do, so little time!
http://bf-astro.com/m106.htm — Great Mouse-over!
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap090529.html — APOD!
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap070411.html
http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2008/arch08/080111mysteriousarms.htm
http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2007/ngc4258/NGC_4258_sm_web.mov – Cool Movie!
http://www.messier.obspm.fr/more/m106_more.html
http://www.iop.org/EJ/article/0004-637X/560/2/689/53617.text.html
http://pan-starrs.ifa.hawaii.edu/public/home.html – PanStarrs info
http://www.robgendlerastropics.com/M106text.html – info on M106
http://www.cloudynights.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/6541985/Main/6541542 — Cloudy Nights Forum discussion
http://www.rochesterastronomy.org/sn2014/sn2014bc.html – info on SN 2014bc