Saturday, 17 July 2010

universe - How can I see a nebula?

Yes, indeed! Many nebulae are visible from Earth in a small and cheap telescope, and even to the naked eye (if you are standing in a sufficiently dark place).



In fact, yesterday I was watching the Orion Nebula with my 4.5" telescope (which is worth $200 or so) from my apartment in the middle of Copenhagen.



The term "nebula" is a bit of a… well, nebulous term, as it covers several distint phenonomena, for instance:



  • Galaxies, e.g. the Andromeda Galaxy

  • Stellar clusters, e.g. the Eagle Nebula

  • Planetary nebulae, e.g. the Eskimo Nebula

  • Supernova remnants, e.g. the Crab Nebula

However, you should be aware that even in a large and expensive telescope, the nebulae do not look anything like the beautiful images you find on the internet. With your eye, you will merely see diffuse, whitish clouds. The beautiful colors arise only in images taken through telescopes with long exposure times. If you want to make such pictures, you will need a telescope with a motor (since the telescope must follow the rotation of the sky) and the possibility of attaching a camera to it. People are often disappointed when shown a nebula through a telescope. I think the beauty of it lies in knowing what it is that you are seeing, knowing for instance that it lies 600 lightyears away, that you are looking 600 years back in time, and that stars are right now being formed there.



Googling something like "nebulae visible in a small telescope" should get you started. Good luck!

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