{"id":31022,"date":"2022-04-21T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-04-21T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/?post_type=purple_issue&p=31022"},"modified":"2022-04-29T14:13:01","modified_gmt":"2022-04-29T14:13:01","slug":"deep-sky-tour-8","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/2022\/04\/21\/deep-sky-tour-8\/","title":{"rendered":"Deep-sky tour"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

We look for objects along the borders of the constellations Ursa Major, Draco and Bo\u00f6tes<\/p>\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n
1. NGC 5907 <\/strong><\/h5>\n\n

Recommended equipment: Small\/medium or large telescope<\/strong><\/p>\n\n

We start with NGC 5907, located 3\u00b0 south of mag. +3.3 Edasich (Iota (\u03b9) Draconis). This is a 10th magnitude spiral galaxy, presented edge-on. It\u2019s just about visible in a 150mm scope, appearing like a 6-arcminute glowing line. Larger apertures will increase the apparent size of the line and reveals the galaxy\u2019s true beauty. A 250mm scope reveals an object 9 arcminutes long and less than an arcminute wide with a brighter central section that represents the galaxy\u2019s core. <\/p>\n\n

2. NGC 5866 <\/strong><\/h5>\n\n

Recommended equipment: Small\/medium or large telescope<\/strong><\/p>\n\n

Known as the Spindle Galaxy, NGC 5866 is located 1.4\u00b0 to the west-southwest of NGC 5907, but it appears smaller. A 150mm scope reveals a bulging streak of light that is 2 arcminutes long, but again, less than an arcminute wide. Larger instruments don\u2019t \u2018grow\u2019 the apparent size that much: a 300m telescope reveals an apparent length of just 3 arcminutes. This is a sideways-on lenticular galaxy, made famous thanks to a Hubble shot that shows it to have a razor-thin dark dust lane running along its axis. This is difficult to see visually, but can be recorded using large astrophotography setups.<\/p>\n\n

3. NGC 5678 <\/strong><\/h5>\n\n

Recommended equipment: Large telescope<\/strong><\/p>\n\n

Galaxy NGC 5678 is located just on the Draco side of the border with Ursa Major. The best \u2018manual\u2019 route for locating it is to drift 4.8\u00b0 to the west of NGC 5866, where you\u2019ll come across the mag. +5.7 star HIP 71111. NGC 5678 is located 2.5\u00b0 to the north of this star. The galaxy has an integrated magnitude of +12.1 and lies 2.6 arcminutes to the southeast of mag. +9.76 TYC 3866-0787-1. This star helps locate the object, but also provides a degree of natural \u2018light pollution\u2019 when looking for the fainter and more diffuse galaxy. A 300mm scope will reveal a 3x 1.5 arcminute object orientated north-south. <\/p>\n\n

\"\"
NGC 5907 is also know as the Knife Edge or Splinter Galaxy <\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n
4. NGC 5585<\/strong><\/h5>\n\n

Recommended equipment: Small\/medium or large telescope<\/strong><\/p>\n\n

NGC 5585 requires a short hop across the border into Ursa Major. Part of what\u2019s known as the M101 group, NGC 5585 is located <\/span>2\u00b0 southwest of NGC 5678. It has an integrated magnitude of +11.2 but as the galaxy is presented to us fairly face-on, it\u2019s little more than a faint glowing patch in a 150mm instrument, roughly an arcminute in diameter. A 250mm instrument fares little better, although the apparent size of the galaxy increases by a factor of three. The diffuse nature of this barred spiral brightens towards the galaxy\u2019s central core, but not by much.<\/p>\n\n

5. M101 <\/strong><\/h5>\n\n

Recommended equipment: Small\/medium or large telescope<\/strong><\/p>\n\n

Face-on spiral galaxy M101 sits within the borders of Ursa Major. The classic way to locate M101 is to first identify the two stars at the end of the handle of the Plough asterism: Mizar (Zeta (\u03b6) Ursae Majoris) and Alkaid (Eta (\u03b7) Ursae Majoris). Imagine these as a base of an equilateral triangle and M101 sits where the triangle\u2019s vertex would lie, to the northeast. The galaxy\u2019s visual mag. +7.7 suggests an easier view than reality delivers, M101 appearing fainter due to it having a low surface brightness. A 150mm scope shows a 20×15 arcminute object, brightening towards its centre. Larger apertures will start to reveal structure in the core region and within the galaxy\u2019s arms. Also known as the Pinwheel Galaxy, M101, is 21 million lightyears away. <\/p>\n\n

6. NGC 5474 <\/strong><\/h5>\n\n

Recommended equipment: Large telescope<\/strong><\/p>\n\n

Our final target sits close to the Draco\u2013Ursa Major border. Lying just within the latter is NGC 5474, a mag. +11.3 dwarf galaxy, 0.7\u00b0 south and a bit east of M101. The closest companion to M101, NGC 5474 is diffuse even in a large scope, appearing 3 arcminutes across. This galaxy is gravitationally influenced by M101 and distorted in such as way that its core is offset relative to the surrounding disc of stars and star-forming regions. As you would expect for a companion of M101, it shares a similar distance at 21.2 million lightyears. Amazingly there is evidence of spirality in NGC 5474\u2019s structure, although a large scope doesn\u2019t show much other than an asymmetric fuzzy patch. The spiral structures give rise to a rare object classified as a dwarf spiral.<\/p>\n\n

\n\n

This Deep-Sky Tour has been automated <\/strong><\/p>\n\n

ASCOM-enabled Go-To mounts can now take you to this month\u2019s targets at the touch of a button, with our Deep-Sky Tour file for the EQTOUR app. Find more details<\/a> online.<\/p>\n\n

Photos: BERNHARD HUBL\/CCDGUIDE.COM, CHART BY PETE LAWRENCE<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We look for objects along the borders of the constellations Ursa Major, Draco and Bo\u00f6tes<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":31454,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ub_ctt_via":"","purple_page_number":"56","purple_custom_meta_purple_page_number":"56","purple_seq_number":"1","purple_custom_meta_purple_seq_number":"1","purple_source_article":"article_56-1.xml","purple_custom_meta_purple_source_article":"article_56-1.xml","purple_source_issue":"May-2022","purple_custom_meta_purple_source_issue":"May-2022","purple_external_id":"May-2022-56-1","purple_custom_meta_purple_external_id":"May-2022-56-1","purple_issue_code":"|0000086552||","purple_custom_meta_purple_issue_code":"|0000086552||","purple_android_product":"com.im.skyatnight.204","purple_custom_meta_purple_android_product":"com.im.skyatnight.204","purple_ios_product":"com.im.skyatnight.204","purple_custom_meta_purple_ios_product":"com.im.skyatnight.204","purple_web_product":"","purple_custom_meta_purple_web_product":"","purple_publication_id":"075fab74-0a21-4201-866a-899d6c41c40c","purple_migrated":"","kt_blocks_editor_width":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[14],"featured_image_src":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2022\/04\/5RYJ13S105I58A8A34LVQU6LD580-rotated.jpg","author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"4","apple_news_title":""},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2022\/04\/5RYJ13S105I58A8A34LVQU6LD580-rotated.jpg",2048,1488,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2022\/04\/5RYJ13S105I58A8A34LVQU6LD580-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2022\/04\/5RYJ13S105I58A8A34LVQU6LD580-300x218.jpg",300,218,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2022\/04\/5RYJ13S105I58A8A34LVQU6LD580-768x558.jpg",768,558,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2022\/04\/5RYJ13S105I58A8A34LVQU6LD580-1024x744.jpg",800,581,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2022\/04\/5RYJ13S105I58A8A34LVQU6LD580-1536x1116.jpg",1536,1116,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2022\/04\/5RYJ13S105I58A8A34LVQU6LD580-rotated.jpg",2048,1488,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"We look for objects along the borders of the constellations Ursa Major, Draco and Bo\u00f6tes","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31022"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31022"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31022\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31678,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31022\/revisions\/31678"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31454"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31022"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31022"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31022"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}