NGC7023 The Iris Nebula (Richard Francis)

Celestial hemisphere: Northern · Constellation: Cepheus (Cep) · Contains: NGC 7023 · VdB139

Powered byPixInsight

NGC7023 The Iris Nebula

Powered byPixInsight

NGC7023 The Iris Nebula

This image is not only beautiful but also very interesting. At its centre is a bright star, which is in reality a triple star (whose components are very close together), the main one being at least 8 times heavier than our Sun. It is about 1000 light-years away, but the uncertainty on this is at least 150 light-years. Surrounding that is a large cloud made up of, essentially, soot.

In some areas this cloud is condensing into new stars, in some it’s being blown away by the radiation from the stars embedded in it. It is also being brightly lit up in blue light, reflecting the light coming from the stars within it. And in other areas it just billows, turning the light from stars behind it to a deep red colour, like a sunset on Earth.

To the left of the central bright star is a vaguely L-shaped void in the sooty clouds, where background stars shine through. In his 1931 catalogue the Swedish astronomer Per Collinder identified this as a star cluster (his identification being Collinder 427). The stars are all very faint at around magnitude 16 or fainter.

The name, Iris Nebula, is supposedly a reference to the flower of the same name, and it was discovered by William Herschel in 1794.

Acquisition details:

Camera: QSI 583wsg

Guide-camera: Starlight-Express LodeStar

Telescope: Officina Stellare Ultra-Corrected RC360

Mount: Paramount ME II

Image scale: 0.56 arcsec/pixel

Total exposure: 9h 15m

Filters:

Red: 35x 300 sec

Green: 26x 300 sec

Blue: 24x 300 sec

Luminance: 26x 300 sec

UK Astro-Imaging

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	2245624
PixInsight job	I2D34ZWCUVDXEWXMHV45PWPL0FAY82WI
PixInsight queue size	n/a
PixInsight stage	n/a

RA (center)	21h01m35s.689
RA (top/left)	20h58m48s.551
RA (top/right)	21h04m22s.872
RA (bottom/right)	21h04m25s.688
RA (bottom/left)	20h58m45s.610

Dec (center)	+68°10′06″.59
Dec (top/left)	+67°58′13″.20
Dec (top/right)	+67°58′13″.79
Dec (bottom/right)	+68°21′49″.50
Dec (bottom/left)	+68°21′48″.79

Image Index:

Contribution Index (beta):

NGC7023 The Iris Nebula

NGC7023 The Iris Nebula

Equipment

Acquisition details

Description

Comments

Sky plot

Histogram

In these public groups

Image Index:

Contribution Index (beta):

NGC7023 The Iris Nebula

NGC7023 The Iris Nebula

Equipment

Acquisition details

Description

Comments

Sky plot

Histogram

In these public groups

Notifications

AstroBin is in READ ONLY mode

Sorry :-(

Sorry :-(

Sorry :-(

Are you really sure?

Warning!

Warning!

Are you sure?

Report abuse

Slideshow settings

IOTD/TP stats (last [x] days)

Distribution of astrophotographers

Distribution of subject types

Distribution of data sources

Sorry

Sorry

Share

Upload new revision

Upload uncompressed source (XISF/FITS/PSD/TIFF)

Delete image and all its revisions?

Delete original image?

Delete all other versions?

Delete all revisions?

IOTD/TP stats

The following people like this image

The following people bookmarked this image

Warning

Flag malfunctioning thumbnails

Contains

Remove yourself as a collaborator

Plate-solving information