M108 Surfboard Galaxy (M108)

Wed, 26 Mar 2025 17:50:04 -0300

The Surfboard Galaxy (also known as Messier Object 108 or NGC 3556) is a barred spiral galaxy about 46 million light-years away from Earth in the northern constellation Ursa Major. It was discovered by Pierre Méchain in 1781 or 1782. From the Earth, this galaxy is seen almost edge-on. This galaxy has an estimated mass of 125 billion solar masses (M☉)[10][note 1] and bears about 290 ± 80 globular clusters.[10] Examination of the distribution of neutral hydrogen in this galaxy shows discrete shells of expanding gas extending for several kiloparsecs, known as H1 supershells. These may be driven by currents of dark matter, dust and gas contributing to large star formation, having caused supernovae explosions. Alternatively they may result from an infall from the intergalactic medium or arise from radio jets Wikipedia - Surfboard Galaxy

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Total image time was 30 minutes.

Exposure

6x300 sec

Gain

100

Camera

ToupTek ATR2600C [6224 x 41684]

Optics

120mm Skywatcher Esprit on a Celestron CGX mount

Guiding

ToupTek GPM462m using Phd2

Controller

Kstars on a MeLe Quieter 3C

Filter

None

Location

Lower Sackville, Nova Scotia.

Date

2024-12-28

Processing

Processed in PixInsight.

Initial crop on all images to reduce processing

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Date: March 26, 2025

ScienceDownEast - ScienceDownEast Astrophotography - M108 (Latest images)

M108 Surfboard Galaxy (M108)