The Virgo Markarians Chain around M86 Orion 8" f/4 Astrograph

Uploaded 5/20/11

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 There are few areas of the sky with the concentration of bright galaxies such as this. The galaxy in the center is a giant elliptical type M86, a 9.8th magnitude object spanning 9 arc minutes or more. I say more, because in the super stretched version seen at the bottom of this page, you can see it is indeed a huge object, occupying much of this 2 degree wide field of view!
 First, lets look at this negative version of the region right around M86. To the galaxies lower left Ive arrowed VCC903, a very faint 19th magnitude elliptical galaxy spanning .2 arc minutes. This seems to be the limit for galaxies in the 8 inch astro graph for a short 30 minute exposure.
 The full extent of all the galaxies can be seen here. M86 is a sizable object for sure!
Optics: 8" f/4 Newtonian Astrograph w/Baader MPCC Coma Corrector Platform: Homemade GEM with Byers Starmaster Drive Camera: Hutech Modified Canon XTi @ ISO800 Exposure: 12 x 5m Location: Happy Jack, Arizona Elevation: 6850 ft. Sky: Seeing 8/10, Transparency 9/10 Outside Temperature: 35F Processing Tools: Photoshop CS2, Images Plus 3.82 HOME GALAXIES EMISSION NEBS REFLECTION NEBS COMETS GLOBULARS OPEN CLUST PLANETARIES LINKS