NGC 6946 - THE FIREWORKS GALAXY (Stefano Attalienti)

Celestial hemisphere: Northern · Constellation: Cygnus (Cyg) · Contains: Fireworks Galaxy · NGC 6946

Powered byPixInsight

NGC 6946 - THE FIREWORKS GALAXY

Powered byPixInsight

NGC 6946 - THE FIREWORKS GALAXY

NGC 6946 is a rather close spiral galaxy, located on the border between the constellations Cepheus and Cygnus. NGC 6946 is a faint but spectacular galaxy called the "fireworks galaxy". NGC 6946 was discovered by William Herschel on September 9, 1798. It was initially suspected to be an outlying member of the Local Group (Hubble 1936). This galaxy is faint and its diffuse oval halo brightens noticeably towards the center. Seen from the front, this beautiful spiral stretches nearly 40,000 light-years across a field of stars to the foreground of our Milky Way galaxy and features four bright arms, loosely coiled around a small center. In the arms the regions in which the ionized hydrogen (HII regions) of its nebulae indicate areas of star formation are clearly evident. Its brightest globular clusters can also be highlighted in long-exposure photos. NGC 6946 is located fairly close to the galactic plane and is heavily obscured by interstellar matter from the Milky Way. At a distance of 10 million light-years, this galaxy is relatively close, but it is not a member of the Local Group of the Milky Way.
As of March 2009, 9 supernovae have been observed in NGC 6946. NGC 6946 is hosting a remarkable phase of star formation for no obvious cause. In many cases spiral galaxies light up when they interact with another galaxy, but NGC 6946 appears relatively isolated in space. A plausible explanation that may account for a particularly high star formation rate is the recent accretion of many very low-mass neutral hydrogen primordial clouds from surrounding regions.

Cloudy Nights
Constructive Critique Requested
Imagers of Italy
ZWO ASI 2600MC PRO
CMOS Imagers

Please note: The following tables are updated every 24 hours.

Distribution of astrophotographers

This table shows the number of distinct astrophotographers who have been assigned and IOTD/TP award compared to the total number of images awarded.
	Distinct awarded users	Total awarded images
Image of the day
Top picks
Top pick nominations

Distribution of subject types

This table shows the distribution of awards per subject type, compared to the popularity of images of that subject type.
	Image of the day	Top pick	Top pick nominations	Total submitted
Deep sky
Solar system
Extremely wide field
Star trails
Northern lights
Noctilucent clouds
Landscape

Distribution of data sources

This table shows the distribution of awards per data source, compared to the popularity of images acquired from that data source.
	Image of the day	Top pick	Top pick nominations	Total submitted
Backyard
Traveller
Own remote observatory
Amateur hosting facility
Public amaeteur data
Professional, scientific grade data
Mix of multiple sources
Other
Unknown

The “AstroBin Image of the Day and Top Picks”, or IOTD/TP, is a long-running system to promote beautiful, interesting, peculiar, or otherwise amazing astrophotographs, with a focus on technical excellence. Learn more.

Submitted The date and time when you submitted this image for IOTD/TP consideration.	...
Views by Submitters (available since September 19th, 2023) Every image is assigned to 50% of available Submitters. In the event that at least 80% of them don't view the image before its time in the IOTD/TP process expires, it's assigned to the other 50% of Submitters and the process begins anew.
Promotions by Submitters When 3 distinct Submitters promote the image, it moves on to the next stage of the process: evaluation for Top Pick status. This requirement, in addition to anonymization of images and distribution to only a subset of them, prevents biases and ensures that the best images are selected.
Promotions by Reviewers When 3 distinct Reviewers promote the image, it moves on to the next stage of the process: evaluation for IOTD status.
Early dismissal Staff members have a lot of images to inspect on a daily basis, and they can dismiss images if they believe they don't meet the requirements for IOTD/TP selection. If an image is dismissed 5 times, it's removed from the process. This streamlines the process and ensures that any bias present in promotions could be overruled by other staff members.

Status	Advanced success
Started	...
Astrometry.net job	6882355
PixInsight job	JYRNABYQYKOYVQS46VBBJB7ODJVY7HVC
PixInsight queue size	n/a
PixInsight stage	TASK_LOG

RA (center)	20h34m50s.592
RA (top/left)	20h37m25s.241
RA (top/right)	20h32m13s.477
RA (bottom/right)	20h32m18s.459
RA (bottom/left)	20h37m26s.222

Dec (center)	+60°09′01″.69
Dec (top/left)	+60°21′49″.89
Dec (top/right)	+60°21′13″.98
Dec (bottom/right)	+59°55′58″.70
Dec (bottom/left)	+59°56′33″.66

Image Index:

Contribution Index (beta):

NGC 6946 - THE FIREWORKS GALAXY

NGC 6946 - THE FIREWORKS GALAXY

Equipment

Acquisition details

Description

Comments

Sky plot

Histogram

In these public groups

		...
You have no new notifications.

Image Index:

Contribution Index (beta):

NGC 6946 - THE FIREWORKS GALAXY

NGC 6946 - THE FIREWORKS GALAXY

Equipment

Acquisition details

Description

Comments

Sky plot

Histogram

In these public groups

Notifications

AstroBin is in READ ONLY mode

Sorry :-(

Sorry :-(

Sorry :-(

Are you really sure?

Warning!

Warning!

Are you sure?

Report abuse

Slideshow settings

IOTD/TP stats (last [x] days)

Distribution of astrophotographers

Distribution of subject types

Distribution of data sources

Sorry

Sorry

Share

Upload new revision

Upload uncompressed source (XISF/FITS/PSD/TIFF)

Delete image and all its revisions?

Delete original image?

Delete all other versions?

Delete all revisions?

IOTD/TP stats

The following people like this image

The following people bookmarked this image

Warning

Flag malfunctioning thumbnails

Contains

Remove yourself as a collaborator

Plate-solving information