The Sombrero Galaxy, M104
Sketches and Details by Jeremy Perez
It’s about time I sketched this beautiful, bright galaxy. Once again, I observed from home, which is not the best place to see structure in galaxies–but the Sombrero was very cooperative. It was conveniently aligned at a PA of 90 degrees. The visible extent appeared to be about 1 x 6 arc minutes. At 120X, the sharp drop in brightness along the south edge was picked up again by a subtle, soft brightening. I would not say the dark lane was apparent at this scale, and under these conditions. At 240X however, the dark lane dividing the two regions was visible. The apparent width of this southern section was about 3 arc minutes.
The heart of the galaxy was punctuated by a stellar core. At 120X, this core appered to be at the edge of the dark lane boundary. At 240X, it was definitely separated from the dark lane. The dark lane appeared to bow very slightly around the stellar core.
Object Information:
M104, the Sombrero Galaxy, lies about 50 million light years away and is a primary member of the M104 group of galaxies. It is an Sa/Sb type galaxy, seen from about 6 degrees above its equatorial plane. It sports a pronounced dust lane as well as a large population of globular clusters. In 1912, it was found to have a large redshift of 1000 km/sec by V. Slipher at Lowell Observatory. M104 was discovered by Pierre Méchain in 1781.
Subject M104 (NGC 4594)
Classification Spiral Galaxy (Sa-Sb)
Position* Virgo [RA: 12:40:00 / Dec: -11:37:00]
Size* 9′ x 4′
Brightness* 8.0 vMag
Date/Time June 21, 2007 – 9:30 PM MST (June 22, 2007 – 04:30 UT)
Observing Loc. Flagstaff, AZ – Home
Instrument Orion SkyQuest XT8 (203 mm dia./1200 mm F/L)
Eyepieces/Mag. 10 mm Sirius Plössl (120X) / 10 mm Sirius Plössl + 2X Barlow (240X)
Conditions Clear, breezy
Seeing 5/10 Pickering
Transparency ~ Mag 5.5 NELM
*References SEDS
Jeremy,
Beautiful renderings of one of my favorites. I recently viewed this beauty from the Arizona desert using a 25 cm. scope. Always impressive and pleasing just like your wonderful sketches.
In my younger days, I imagined myself viewing globular clusters from a planet in this galaxy.
Frank 🙂
Frank, thanks very much 🙂
I really like the idea of picturing yourself there, observing the sky’s wonders from a galaxy that’s richly adorned with globular clusters.
Jeremy
Jeremy,
An excellent report, well documented with two top notch sketches! Nice to study the difference with the used powers as well.
Rony