Thanks Winrar for the compliment! And i'm glad that you spend more time looking at the night sky hi19hi19, but has this thread helped you distinguish what some of the night time objects are? That's part of the goal of this thread.
What's in the sky tonight?
March 31, 2012
-The Moon shines high in the southwest this evening. It forms a gently curving line (as seen from North America) with Pollux and Castor to its upper right and Procyon below it. Procyon is one of the 3 stars in the Winter Triangle, and as it sets earlier and earlier every day, it's an astronomical sign spring and summer are upon us.
Astro Picture of the Day:
March 31, 2012
Source:
Meet M9. M9 is a globular cluster discovered by Charles Messier, and listed it as the 9th entry in his catalogue (hence Messier 9). He listed this globular cluster as a "Nebula, without star, in the right leg of Ophiuchus ...". Optics have improved since the 18th century however, and this 'starless nebula' has been found to contain over 300,000 stars within a diameter of 90 light years. It is some 25,000 light years distant near the central bulge of our milky way galaxy. This picture takes a look at the central 25 light years of the cluster. At least twice the age of the Sun and deficient in heavy elements, the cluster stars have colors corresponding to their temperatures, redder stars are cooler, bluer stars are hotter. Many of the cluster's cool red giant stars show a yellowish tint in the sharp Hubble view. Globular clusters are typically found -outside- the disk of spiral galaxies, and are evidence that a spiral galaxy was once more spherical in shape before flattening into a disk with a bulge.