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IMPORTANT: Our store is located in Canada. All orders that include products manufactured outside of Canada or USA will be subject to tariffs and duties, regardless of the order value. US customers are responsible for all applicable duties and tariffs, and those will be billed by the carrier, except for the Lacerta upgrade kit, for which we collect them at checkout.
SH2-132 - The most interesting nebula

SH2-132 - The most interesting nebula

SH2-132
The most interesting nebula

Location

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Below, you can see SH2-132, the lion nebula, in the Cepheus constellation, imaged by our employee Anthony Brunet-Bessette.

It is located at 10,400 light-years from our solar system, which is equivalent to 10^16 kilometers. We all can agree, that's a long distance.

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Equipment used to photograph this nebula

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Do you see the blue light beam ?

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This light beam confused Anthony when he saw the stacking result of the Suflur II, Hydrogen α and Oxygen III frames. He tought he had an image calibration failure such as wrong flats, because this kind of light pattern is not usual in nebulaes.

After looking at his calibrated images, Anthony concluded that there was no issue with the flats.

But what exactly is this strange artefact ?

According to leading astrophysicists, it is a caracteristic of this nebula. To be more precise, the artefact is a strong stellar wind caused by several Wolf-Rayet stars.

Importance of nebulaes like these in Astrophysics

According to several sources, the Lion nebula is well known in the Astrophysics domain. The scientists study this object, because of its surrounding. For instance :

  • A lot of Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars such as HD 211564 and HD 211853;
  • A lot of dark nebulaes (LDN) who block some of the stars' light;
  • Very small planetary nebulaes discovered recently;
  • and much more!
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