M2 Globular Star Cluster

Description

Messier 2, or M2 (also designated NGC 7089), is a globular cluster in the constellation Aquarius, five degrees north of the star Beta Aquarii. It was discovered by Jean-Dominique Maraldi in 1746 and is one of the largest known globular clusters.

Discovery and visibility
M2 was discovered by the French astronomer Jean-Dominique Maraldi in 1746 while observing a comet with Jacques Cassini. Charles Messier rediscovered it in 1760 but thought that it was a nebula without any stars associated with it. William Herschel, in 1783, was the first to resolve individual stars in the cluster.

M2 is, under excellent conditions, just visible to the naked eye. Binoculars or a small telescope will identify this cluster as non-stellar, while larger telescopes will resolve individual stars, of which the brightest are of apparent magnitude 6.5.

Data/Processing Attribution

This is my data and processing.

Distances/Size

Distance to the object: 55,000 light-years.

Equipment

Mount-PlaneWave L-350; Scope-PlaneWave CDK14″, 356 mm aperture, 2563 mm focal length; Camera-Moravian C3-61000, 0.30 arcsec/pixel.

Observatory

The image was captured at the Prairie Skies Astro remote observatory.

Exposure

The total exposure using RGB filters is 1 hour and 21 minutes, with each sub-exposure lasting 90 seconds.

 

RGB Filters for stars

R- 24X90= 36 minutes

G-18X90= 27 minutes

B-18X90= 18 minutes

Processing is done in PixInsight, Photoshop, and Lightroom Classic

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