© Josep M. Drudis-2016, Mount Lemmon Sky Center, AZ, USA.
Click here for full resolution image
When M 77 was discovered by Mechain, in 1780, he described it as a nebula. When Messier incorporated it to his catalog, he assigned it the category of a star cluster (by the way, Herschel also did the same mistake…). It was Lord Rosse who identified it as a “spiral nebula” mid XIX Century. M 77 is larger than the Milky Way and it is an active Seyfert galaxy. Being the closest such galaxy to us, it is a thoroughly studied galaxy. This image was taken with the Schulman Telescope (32″) from Sky Center, Mount Lemmon, AZ. This one is my version.
Additional Information
Object
Name(s): M77. NGC 1068. Cetus A
Type: Spiral galaxy
RA: 02h 42m 40s
Dec: -00º 00’ 54”
Constellation: Cetus
Size (arcmin): 7×6
Magnitude: +8.9
Distance: 33 Mly
Image
Date: 2014-11-25 thru 2015-01-06
Location: Sky Center, Mount Lemmon, AZ, USA
Size (arcmin): 22×22
Telescope: Schulman Telescope, 32″ (81cm) f/7
Camera: SBIG STX16803 (4096x4096pix)
Guiding: Internal camera guider
Total exposure: 28hs (R: 8.5hs; G:7.5hs; B: 7hs)
Processing: CCDStack, Photoshop CC 2016 and PixInsight