The Starburst Galaxy M82 – the Cigar galaxy

About the Object

What to shoot when it's late winter during full moon? Targets are rare and the nights are long but bright. Well, Halpha of galaxies is a good use, e.g., for M82, the poster child of a starburst galaxy featuring large scale outflows  emitting in Halpha. Collecting lot's of Halpha not only enables to get considerable detail in the outflows, it also shows some detached Halpha clouds in the environ.

There is another noteworthy object in the image besides the already mentioned detached Halpha cloud: in the Northeast corner, there is an extended chainlike structure of faint background galaxies connecting two galaxy groups/clusters, revision D zooms in on that nice feature.

Observation Notes

Data were taken on 2025 February 8,10,12 15, 16, 18, 19, 21

Technical Details

View the full-resolution image together with complete acquisition and processing details on AstroBin.