Nebulae
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The Spiral Planetary Nebula, NGC 5189
The colourful and intricately shaped Spiral Planetary Nebula (NGC 5189) is located up to 3000 light years away in the Southern constellation Musca. It is a very complex nebula with a morphology not well understood by scientists.
Several expanding bubbles of gas appear in its centre, emitting a predominantly blue-green light from ionised Oxygen. Surrounding these bubble structures lies the large sweeping spiral shape, brilliantly shining with a magenta hue from ionised Hydrogen, similar to that of traditional emission nebulae.
The full frame image shows the small nebula nestled amongst countless reddish stars in Musca, a densely populated region of our Milky Way galaxy.
The majority of the image data was taken on 19th March 2014, two days after full Moon.
Image details:
Date: 7th and 19th March 2014
Exposure: LRGB: 113:105:105:25 mins, total 5 hours 48 mins @ -25C
Telescope: Homebuilt 12.5" f/4 Homebuilt Serrurier Truss Newtonian
Camera: QSI 683wsg with Lodestar guider
Filters: Astrodon LRGB E-Series Gen 2
Taken from my observatory in Auckland, New Zealand
