M46 (Kirby Collins)

Celestial hemisphere: Southern · Constellation: Puppis (Pup) · Contains: 140 Pup · M 46 · NGC 2437 · NGC 2438 · PK231+04.1 · PK231+04.2

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M46

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M46

M46 is an open cluster located in the constellation Puppis in the southern part of our sky. Messier discovered it in 1771 - it was the first object he discovered after he published the first edition of his catalog (M1-45). Herschel viewed it in 1786 and described it as "A beautiful, very rich, compressed cluster of stars of various magnitudes."

The cluster has 150 bright stars and perhaps 500 total, scattered over an area the size of the full Moon. Of particular note is the planetary nebula (NGC 2438 ) visible here in the upper right part of the cluster. As discussed in an earlier post...planetary nebulae don't actually have anything to do with planets...they are shells of gas shed by stars late in their life. Early astronomers thought they resembled planets due to their round appearance. Extra credit: if you look closely there is another planetary nebula [Minkowsky 1-18] to the right of the cluster...look for a small reddish-gray circle. The 5th magnitude red giant star to the lower left doesn't have a name, but is catalogued as SAO 153227.

Please note: The following tables are updated every 24 hours.

Distribution of astrophotographers

This table shows the number of distinct astrophotographers who have been assigned and IOTD/TP award compared to the total number of images awarded.
	Distinct awarded users	Total awarded images
Image of the day
Top picks
Top pick nominations

Distribution of subject types

This table shows the distribution of awards per subject type, compared to the popularity of images of that subject type.
	Image of the day	Top pick	Top pick nominations	Total submitted
Deep sky
Solar system
Extremely wide field
Star trails
Northern lights
Noctilucent clouds
Landscape

Distribution of data sources

This table shows the distribution of awards per data source, compared to the popularity of images acquired from that data source.
	Image of the day	Top pick	Top pick nominations	Total submitted
Backyard
Traveller
Own remote observatory
Amateur hosting facility
Public amaeteur data
Professional, scientific grade data
Mix of multiple sources
Other
Unknown

The “AstroBin Image of the Day and Top Picks”, or IOTD/TP, is a long-running system to promote beautiful, interesting, peculiar, or otherwise amazing astrophotographs, with a focus on technical excellence. Learn more.

Submitted The date and time when you submitted this image for IOTD/TP consideration.	...
Views by Submitters (available since September 19th, 2023) Every image is assigned to 50% of available Submitters. In the event that at least 80% of them don't view the image before its time in the IOTD/TP process expires, it's assigned to the other 50% of Submitters and the process begins anew.
Promotions by Submitters When 3 distinct Submitters promote the image, it moves on to the next stage of the process: evaluation for Top Pick status. This requirement, in addition to anonymization of images and distribution to only a subset of them, prevents biases and ensures that the best images are selected.
Promotions by Reviewers When 3 distinct Reviewers promote the image, it moves on to the next stage of the process: evaluation for IOTD status.
Early dismissal Staff members have a lot of images to inspect on a daily basis, and they can dismiss images if they believe they don't meet the requirements for IOTD/TP selection. If an image is dismissed 5 times, it's removed from the process. This streamlines the process and ensures that any bias present in promotions could be overruled by other staff members.

Status	Advanced success
Started	...
Astrometry.net job	5472799
PixInsight job	QH8CWQFXBNIC6J2W1V5O0CWAXGIF707Q
PixInsight queue size	n/a
PixInsight stage	TASK_LOG

RA (center)	07h41m47s.13
RA (top/left)	07h44m11s.62
RA (top/right)	07h44m00s.24
RA (bottom/right)	07h39m23s.90
RA (bottom/left)	07h39m33s.21

Dec (center)	-14°48′13″.2
Dec (top/left)	-15°37′10″.5
Dec (top/right)	-13°57′35″.8
Dec (bottom/right)	-13°59′16″.6
Dec (bottom/left)	-15°38′52″.6

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