Messier 78 region

Constellation: Orion

This is a mosaic composed of 4 panes of the region around Messier 78 in the constellation of Orion. Link to interactive sky chart.

This region also contains the open cluster NGC 2112, which is located about 2’770 Ly from Earth. To the northeast, one can see the LDN 1622, also called the Boogeyman nebula, which is thought to be only 500 Ly away from Earth.

Dates:

This image is a 4-pane mosaic taken in December 2021 and January 2022

Linked image(s):

Telescope & Mount:

Celestron 9.25″ EdgeHD with Hyperstar 4.0 on a Celestron CGX-L mount. Guiding with Tecnosky 70/400 and an ASI290MM Mini.

Imaging:

Camera: ASI2600MC-Pro (bin 1×1)

Data:
Optolong L-Pro: 575x30s

Total integration time: 4h 47′ 30″

Messier 78 (NGC 2068) is the brightest reflection nebula  of a group of nebulae that includes NGC 2064, NGC 2067 and NGC 2071. This group belongs to the Orion B molecular cloud complex that is about 1’350 Ly away from Earth. North of NGC 2071, one can see a small and faint reflection nebula designated [B77] 100, most likely illuminated by the star HD 290857  of spectral class F8.

Below we are taking a closer look at Messier 78: Planewave CDK24 (F6.5) on a Planewave L600 mount with a Moravian G3-61000 (bin 2×2) in LHaRGB with a total integration time of 19h 45′. The two Herbig-Haro objects HH 23 (left) and HH 22 (right) are nicely visible at the top right of the image.

The region just south and southwest of Messier 78 contains many Herbig-Haro objects designated HH 19 to HH 27. The crossbow looking region contains HH24A through HH24G2, while the region below the nebula contains HH 25 and HH 26. This region contains the highest concentration of astrophysical jets known anywhere in the sky.

The star at the center of the image is the T Tauri star HBC 502 of spectral class K3. T Tauri stars are less than about ten million years old and considered pre-main sequence stars in the process of contracting to become main sequence stars. HBC 502 has a surface temperature of approx. 4830 °K, is about 1’340 Ly from Earth, is 10.71 times as luminous as the Sun and has about twice its mass. It is 0.53 My “old”, and has a protoplanetary disk of type Ib (Link to source).