M101 Deep Field

clic for 50% size 1800 x 1304 (550 kB)

 


About this Image

The Pinwheel Galaxy M 101 is revealed as one of the most prominent face on spirals in the sky. While quite symmetric visually and in very short exposures which show only the central region, it is of remarkable unsymmetry, its core being considerably displaced from the center of the disk. Halton Arp has included M101 as No. 26 in his Catalogue of Peculiar Galaxies as a "Spiral with One Heavy Arm".
It lies at 24 million light years distance in the constellation of Ursa Major.

Checkout a close-up at F/10: here.

A closeup at M101 in 40/80% size is shown below.

clic for 80% size (160 kB)


M101 is interacting with its brightest companion, the distorted galaxy NGC 5474 (type Sc, 10.85 mag vis) shown below in detail in 80% size.

 


Technical Details
Optics

16" cassegrain in corrected primefocus at f/3

Mount MK-100 GEM
Camera SBIG STL-11000M at -25C, 1x1 bin, internal filter wheel
Filters Astronomik LRGB
Date Apr 06, 2005.
Location Wildon/Austria
Sky Conditions mag 5 sky, good seeing, temperature 5 C
Exposure L:R:G:B = 180:30:30:30 minutes (10-minute sub-exposures),
Processing Image aquisition, calibration, color combining in Maxim DL 4.0; DDP in ImagesPlus; color balance, curves, unsharp mask in Photoshop; Noise reduction in Neatimage;
north is up left;