New Image Sets Available In Starbase!

New image sets are available for downloading from Insight Observatory's Starbase Image Set Repository! Over the course of the past six months, all three remote Astronomical Telescopes for Educational Outreach (ATEO) have been busy gathering image data for Starbase as well as various educational projects.

Listed below are just a few image sets that are now available and acquired on Insight Observatory's ATEO remote telescopes...

NGC 1365 - The "Great Barred Spiral Galaxy" in the constellation Fornax. Imaged data acquired on ATEO-3 by Franck Jobard and processed by Utkarsh Mishra.

ATEO-1 - 16" f/3.75 Dream Aerospace Systems astrograph reflector:

• M101 - Luminance (2020): Pinwheel Galaxy - 5 hours 
• M101 - Red, Green, Blue (2020): Pinwheel Galaxy - 7 Hours 10 Minutes

• M81-M82 - Luminance (2020): Bode's and Cigar Galaxies - 6 Hours 50 Minutes 
• M81-M82 - RGB (2020): Bode's and Cigar Galaxies - 17 Hours 15 Minutes

• NGC 5907 - Luminance (2020): Knife Edge or Splinter Galaxy - 20 Hours 20 Minutes

NGC 5907 - The Knife Edge or Splinter Galaxy (left) imaged on ATEO-1, M81, and M82 - Bode's and Cigar Galaxies (upper right) imaged on ATEO-1, and IC 405 - The Flaming Star Nebula (lower right) imaged on ATEO-2A.

ATEO-2A - 5" f/5.8 Wiliams Optics APO refractor:

• IC405 One-Shot Color (2020): Flaming Star Nebula - 3 Hours 30 Minutes

ATEO-3 - 12.5" f/9 Quasar Ritchey-Chretien:

• Gum 15 - Luminance (2020): Nebula in Vela - 12 Hours 20 Minutes 
• Gum 15 - RGB (2020): Nebula in Vela - 6 Hours 40 Minutes

• NGC 1365 - Luminance (2020): Great Barred Spiral Galaxy - 7 Hours 40 Minutes 
• NGC 1365 - RGB (2020): Great Barred Spiral Galaxy - 8 Hours 20 Minutes

Learn more about Insight Observatory's Starbase or download these and more image sets by logging in or signing up to Starbase HERE.

For any questions regarding Starbase, please Contact Us.

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Featured Deep-Sky Object - IC 405 - Flaming Star Nebula

This Insight Observatory "Feature Deep-Sky Object" post highlights the emission/reflection nebula, IC 405 - The Flaming Star Nebula, located in the constellation of Auriga. On the evening of December 22, 2017, Insight Observatory's managing member and project developer, Michael Petrasko was remoted into their Astronomical Telescope for Educational Outreach (ATEO) system downloading data from a previous observing run to gather image data requested from users utilizing Insight Observatory's ATEO Public Image Request Form. The sky conditions were pristine and as Michael was wrapping up with his tasks, he figured; why not take advantage of the weather conditions and image an object he has never imaged or visually observed through a telescope before.

IC 405 (also known as the Flaming Star Nebula, SH 2-229, or Caldwell 31) imaged on the ATEO
by Michael Petrasko and processed with PixInsight 8.1 by Muir Evenden.

Browsing through the open-source planetarium software, Stellarium, Michael spotted a deep-sky object that was placed perfectly in the sky for imaging out in New Mexico where the remote telescope system resides. He then proceeded to acquire 10 images at 120 seconds each with the Luminance filter and 5 120-second exposures each with the Red, Green, and Blue filters.

IC 405 shines at magnitude +6.0 and surrounds the irregular variable star AE Aurigae. It is also located near the emission nebula IC 410, the open clusters M38 and M36, and the K-class star Iota Aurigae. The nebula measures approximately 37.0' x 19.0', and lies about 1,500 light-years away from Earth. It is believed that the proper motion of the central star can be traced back to the Orion's Belt area. The nebula is about 5 light-years across.

Location of IC 405 - The Flaming Star Nebula as displayed on Stellarium.

The full-resolution image of IC 405 can be viewed on Insight Observatory's Image Gallery. If you are interested in imaging deep-sky images like this using the Astronomical Telescope for Educational Outreach (ATEO), please visit the ATEO Image Request Page for more information.

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