Lunchtime Photo

My latest bit of astrophotography is an image of the M81 Group, which consists of three big galaxies and a bunch of dwarf hangers-on. The big one in the picture is M81, aka Bode's galaxy. The smaller one (seen side-on)  is M82, aka the Cigar galaxy.

I'm not posting this because it's an especially good photograph. It's not. However, it's remarkably good considering I took it in my backyard under a full moon.

This was sort of an accident. I bought a new electric focuser for my telescope and I wanted to test it out just to make sure it worked. I don't need a dark sky for that, so I hauled my gear into the backyard and set it up. Then, once I had the focuser working, I figured I might as well take a picture or two. My backyard is hemmed in by trees, so I had to search out something interesting that was up and visible in the small part of the sky I could see. M81 was the winner.

As you may know, we live on the outer edges of the Milky Way galaxy, which is part of the Local Group (us, the Andromeda galaxy, and the Triangulum galaxy). The M81 Group is our nearest neighbor, a mere 11 million light years away. We are both part of the Virgo Supercluster, which in turn is part of the Laniakea Supercluster Complex. There are five supercluster complexes in the universe, and Laniakea is ours. Remember that when the next massive intergalactic war breaks out.