"...Anchored in the frame at bottom center by prominent lenticular galaxies, M84 (bottom) and M86, you can follow the chain up and to the right. Near center you'll spot the pair of interacting galaxies NGC 4438 and NGC 4435, known to some as Markarian's Eyes. Its center an estimated 50 million light-years distant, the Virgo Cluster itself is the nearest galaxy cluster. With up to about 2,000 member galaxies, it has a noticeable gravitational influence on our own Local Group of Galaxies. Within the Virgo Cluster at least seven galaxies in Markarian's Chain appear to move coherently, although others may appear to be part of the chain by chance."
https://science.nasa.gov/markarians-chain"Markarian's chain was named after an Armenian astronomer in the 1970s and represents a beautiful stretch of galaxies that forms part of the Virgo Cluster. Our own Local Group of galaxies (Milky Way, large and small Magellenic Clouds, M31, M32, M100, M33) is currently receding from the Virgo Cluster at a rate of about 1000 km/second. However, it is anticipated that our Local Group will eventually stop receding from the Virgo Cluster and will ultimately accelerate towards this region (gravity from the Virgo Cluster influences us even at distances of 70 million light years)."
http://www.starrywonders.com/markarian.htmlThe Markanians Chain have been a good challenge. The amount of data made by Maurizio in the months of March and April 2021 gave several results.
To make the stack in DSS, they were divided according to filter and ISO and an average was made in the exposure time, since all the flats associated with those times were not available (it's a long and short story, we continue for certain sessions with the 'flats creative') and basically three stacks were obtained in DSS, one for each filter.
For Siril, only sessions made with L-Pro were processed.
The Stack product of Siril was done in two jobs, one was developed in linear form and then the Histogram Transformation was applied while the other was developed normally with the stretch of levels and arc sinh curves in PS.
The DSS stack presented a cut in the extreme left vertical galaxy (NGC 4387) while in the Siril stack it came out complete since in three sessions Maurizio had included it in the frame. In Siril I use a script so it is a surprise to see what the final frame is and this one presented it completely.
But since it was too much on the edge in January of this year we decided to dedicate a full session to it to include more area to the left and right of the main frame and a total of two additional hours were added.
Squaring those areas was a bit of a headache and less than a third of it was used on each side.
This set of galaxies offer the viewer a rare view of the various forms they can present in addition to other celestial bodies associated with them. Every time we see the image it has been a constant fascination to be able to observe the number of galaxies in that area.
Without a doubt, M 88 flourishes among them because also in the DSS stack it presented coloration as well as 'The Eyes' (NGC 4438 and NGC 4435 and the galaxies in vertical profile NGC 4402 and NGC 4387) which I tried to highlight slightly, while the rest only presented a cream and light coloration.
In the Review area we put a crop of all the most notable galaxies in that area with their annotation.
We hope you can enjoy the Markanians Chain as much as we do.
Processed Dec 2021 - January 2022
https://twitter.com/AstroOtus/status/1486148704553865220
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