Inside the Heart nebula, IC1805, we can find an open star cluster, Melotte 15, composed of young and energetic stars. This group of stars are eroding colorful pillars of dust with their energetic light winds.
The Heart nebula, catalogued as IC1805, is a large emission nebula located in the Perseus Arm of the Milky Way galaxy. It’s located in the constellation Cassiopeia and is part of a complex star-forming region that includes the neighboring Soul Nebula (IC 1848) and the open cluster Melotte 15. It’s located some 7,500 light years away from Earthand and was discovered by William Herschel on the 3rd of November 1787.
Curiosities:
Close to LBN 658 we can find a small planetary nebula (blueish color) with an almost perfect elliptical shape.
Image acquisition:
To capture this image I used my wide field setup that consists of the FRA300 telescopes and the ASI2600MM camera. I used narrow band filters to compose this color mapping also known as the Hubble Palette, where the red channel is assigned to the [SII] data, the green channel to the Ha data, and the Blue channel to the [OIII] data.
Broadband filters (R, G, B) have been used to capture the star’s colors.
The full image covers an area of 4º28′ x 2º58′ at a resolution of 2.59″/pixel.
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Image Details
[SII]: 264 x 300″ (22h)
Ha: 317 x 300″ (26h 25”)
[OIII]: 398 x 300″ (33h10′)
RGB: (60, 60, 60) x 60″ (3h)
Calibrated with darks, flats, dark-flats.
Total exposure: 84h35′
Average Moon phase at 60%
Image resolution: 2.59”/pixel
FOV (full image): 4º28′ x 2º58′
Equipment
FRA300 + ASI2600MM + LRGB ZWO filters + ZWO EFW 7 pos + ZWO EAF
ZWO AM5 mount
ASI AIR Plus
Guiding with ASI120MM and ZWO Mini Guide Scope
Software
ASI Air software, APP, PIX, TPZ, LR, PS.
Aleix Roig, March 2024
Prades (Tarragona, Catalonia – Spain).