Neptune - methane in the ice giant's atmosphere (Mattes)

Contains: Solar system body or event

Neptune - methane in the ice giant's atmosphere

This is Neptune as seen through the Star Analyser 100. I used the spectrum of Vega to calibrate/check the spectral line at 486nm that is common to both, hydrogen and methane. Unfortunately I was unable to stack the images recorded in Pixinsight so I analysed a single frame. The atmosphere of the ice giant Neptune mainly consits of hydrogen (80%) and helium (19%) but trace amounts of methane and ammonia can be found. The absorption lines of methane in the red and infrared part of the spectrum result in the blueish colour of the planet. The planet has roughly 17x the mass of earth and is dense compared to the gas giants Jupiter and Saturn. I also detected its moon Triton (at least im pretty sure). This moon displays a retrograde orbit and is therefore most likely a Kuiper belt object captured by Neptune.

1 frame / gain 300 / 20s

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Description: The spectral profile alone

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Description: A single frame, slightly stretched and cropped

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Neptune - methane in the ice giant's atmosphere

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