Same Picture With A Better Post Treatment Of The Original Data.

Finished working on my photo of the hors head.

Technically speaking the Horse Head is only the dark nebula, is bright hydrogen cloud behind it is known as IC434 and the second nebula (bottom left) is the flame nebula. The bright star in the center left is Zeta Orionis also known as Alnitak one of the three stars of Orion's Belt. IC434 primary ionisation source is the multiple star system Sigma Orionis (a bit above the frame), the hydrogen cloud being mostly ionise by the UV coming from those blue giant stars. The streaks visible in the nebulosity are mostly likely due to magnetic field within.

The Flame nebula's ionisation source is hidden behind it's dust cloud and is most likely part of a star cluster that Is only reviled using IR and X-ray imaging.

This photo appears mostly blue/teal wear-as most photos of this nebula are red(ish) this is because this nebula emits most of it's light in the H-alpha (656 nm) and S-II (around 672 nm) wavelength both of which are red, so in classic RGB images the nebula appears red. Initially I thought of doing an SHO image (were red is SII emission, green is H-alpha and blue is OIII) but this nebula lacks OIII emission (around 500 nm), so instead a used a modified SHH palette More precisely, I used SII for the red, a combination of both Ha and SII (0.8Ha + 0.2SII) for green and Ha for blue. The stars were taken separately in RGB and added back to the SHH image.

(Image taken using a CarbonStar 150/600 newtonian telescope with a 0.95 coma corrector, ZWO ASI294 monochrome camera and Baader 6.5nm SHO filter. 5x120s image for each colour filter (RGB), 22x300s for the Ha filter and 32x300s for the SII filter, total imaging time 5h, stacking and processing done in PixInsight.)

can I read posts on the internet lightning speed ? yes.

can I read a scientific publication quickly ? also yes !!!

now, can I read a normal book at a somewhat regular speed ? no, I have to re-read the previous page, hell the previous chapter because I forgot what the conversation between the character was about !

II took another photo of M51 / the whirlpool galaxy, same camera and same processing of the data, but I used a different (bigger) telescope. Here, using a bigger telescope has two major effects, firstly the image is more ''zoomed in'' since the focal length is longer. Secondly, since the diameter is bigger the maximal (angular) resolution of the image can be increased. This increase in resolution is due to the way the waves of light are diffracted by the aperture of the optical instrument (in short bigger aperture = better resolution). This increase in resolution is one of the reasons professional telescopes have gigantic mirrors and/or use telescope arrays combined with interferometry to increase their maximal angular resolution.

Picture of the helix nebula / Caldwell 63, this one was a bit of a pain to take as this nebula stays relatively close to the horizon where I live, plus, due to the position of trees and building I only get 1h per night to take photos (had to use pictures from two different nights to get to about 2h of exposure).

This object is also a planetary nebula, like M27 I previously photographed, but it appears much bigger (about 2.5 times) in parte due to it being closer to earth (about 650 light-years compared to about 1360 light-years for the dumbbell nebula/M27).

This nebula has sometimes been referred to as ''the eye of god'' I think you can guess why.

The soon to be white dwarf star at the center of the nebula is (to me at least) a bit more visible in this picture than in the one of M27.

This is a picture of the hydrogen and dust cloud surrounding the star Sadr (the bright white dot near the center) also known as IC 1318. The bright parts represent hydrogen clouds and the dark parts dust clouds. Those types of clouds are the birthplace of new stars. This particular photo is in black and white because it was made by using a filter that lets only the light emitted by ionised hydrogen (the H alpha spectral line) pass through it. This increases the visibility of the hydrogen clouds. Since this light is at 656 nm, it would appear bright red if coloured. Together with H beta (496 nm) also from hydrogen and O III (around 500 nm) from oxygen both cyan in color, they represent the majority of light emitted by gas clouds. So in conclusion if you were able to see this gas cloud directly it would appear a reddish-magenta color (H alpha being the dominant emission).

Photos of the two major components of the veil nebula, the first one is the eastern veil aka C33 and the second one (the one with the star in the middle) the western veil aka C34. Those are part of a supernova remnant (left over gas and dust from a supernova), their colour are due mainly to two gases present inside. The blue/green colour comes mostly from oxygen (as OIII emission around 500nm by doubly ionised oxygen) and a little bit from hydrogen (as H beta emission at 486nm) where as the red comes nearly completely from hydrogen (as H alpha emission at 656nm).

The first photo is about 2.5 hours of exposure (30x3 min for RGB + 10x5 min for H alpha) and the second one about 3 hours (36x3 min for RGB + 16x5 min for H alpha).

The additional photos taken in hydrogen alpha are added to the normal RGB photos to intensify the colour and visibility of the hydrogen gas (it doesn't show well enough with standard RGB in part due to the lower amount of light it emits an in part due to the sensor's response itself) Here is a version of C33 (eastern veil) with the stars removed as my friends were very impressed by it, hope you like it too.

I was able to see and take pictures of the comet C2023/A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS) ! This comet will be visible in the night sky probably for the next week or two, it's currently visible both with a pair of binoculars and with the naked eye. Since it's visible very early after sunset, it's a bit difficult to spot for now, but in the coming days it's will gradually be visible later in the night and thus easier to observe.

This comet is one of the brightest in the last few years so it should be quite easy to observe.

I hope you all get a chance to see it, it's magnificent

I've worked in a chemistry lab, they had a room with all the analysis and purification equipment. There was a constant noise due to the various pumps (vacuum, solvent, ...) and valves. After just a few days working there I could telle exactly with machin was doing what task and at what point it was in that process just based upon the noise they made.

This reminded me of the isonitrile freezer at my previous internship.

For those who don't know, isonitriles (aka isocyanides) are a class of compounds that contain this motif:

They are known to smell very bad and many synthesis pathways to those compounds were discovered because of their stench. (I personally think they smell like a mixture of rotten cabbage and burned rubber but more ''artificial'')

So in that lab, we had a freezer dedicated to them, and even with sealed bottles in à -20°C freezers in a separated and ventilated cabinet, you would still be able to detect their odour if you stood next to it (not strongly, but still detectable).

We had to move that freezer to a new lab, it stayed unplugged for 15 to 20 minutes, and in the 5 minutes we need to power it back in the new lab, the entire room had filled with that isonitrile stench (mind you that freezer had not been open during the entire operation). Thankfully we did that on a Friday afternoon and by Monday the smell had disappeared.

Just for reference this is from the MSDS of benzyl isonitrile :

found on a fridge in my lab, haha