Abell 70 is a planetary nebula located 13,500-17,500 light years away in the constellation of Aquila. It is approaching the earth at 79 kilometers per second and expanding 38 kilometers per second. There is a galaxy named PMN J2033-0656 behind Abell 70, giving it a "diamond ring" effect.

Abell 70 is a planetary nebula located 13,500-17,500 light years away in the constellation of Aquila. It is approaching the earth at 79 kilometers per second and expanding 38 kilometers per second. There is a galaxy named PMN J2033-0656 behind Abell 70, giving it a "diamond ring" effect

Round 9.....................................

Billionaire Space Race (is the rivalry among entrepreneurs who have entered the space industry from other industries - particularly computing. This private industry space race of the 21st century involves sending rockets to the ionosphere (mesosphere and thermosphere), orbital launch rockets, and suborbital tourist spaceflights. Today, the billionaire space race is primarily between three billionaires and their respective firms: Jeff Bezos's Blue Origin, which is seeking to establish an industrial base in space. Richard Branson's Virgin Group (through Virgin Galactic and Virgin Orbit), which seeks to dominate space tourism, low-cost small orbital launch vehicles, and intercontinental sub-orbital spaceflight. Elon Musk's SpaceX, which seeks to colonize Mars as well as provide satellite-based internet through its Starlink project. Prior to his death in 2018, Paul Allen was also a major player in the billionaire space race through the aerospace division of his firm Vulcan. Allen sought to reduce the cost of launching payloads into orbit)

Calling it a night...........................................

Cape Canaveral - America's largest launch center, used for all manned launches. Today only six of the 40 launch complexes built here remain in use. Located at or near Cape Canaveral are the Kennedy Space Center on Merritt Island, used by NASA for Saturn V and Space Shuttle launches; Patrick AFB on Cape Canaveral itself, operated the US Department of Defense and handling most other launches; the commercial Spaceport Florida; the air-launched launch vehicle and missile Drop Zone off Mayport, Florida, located at 29.00 N 79.00 W, and an offshore submarine-launched ballistic missile launch area. All of these take advantage of the extensive down-range tracking facilities that once extended from the Cape, through the Caribbean, South Atlantic, and to South Africa and the Indian Ocean.

Good one PTG........................

Dragonfish Nebula (as it is known for its appearance on infrared images, is a massive emission nebula and star-forming region 30,000 light-years from the Sun in the direction of the constellation Crux, the Southern Cross. The Dragonfish Nebula gets its name from a giant toothy fish known as the deep-sea dragonfish. The giant stars in this nebula blow a bubble in the surrounding gas. This bubble is over 100 light-years long and forms the mouth of the dragonfish. The two largest and luminous stars, which form its eyes, are said to be newly formed stars. The stars heat up the surrounding gas, giving off infrared light. The Dragonfish Nebula contains some of the most massive stars in the Milky Way galaxy. This nebula was first discovered in 2010 by Mubdi Rahman and Norman Murray from the University of Toronto. They discovered a cloud of ionized gas which led them to suspect that it was formed from the radiation of nearby stars. Since then more than four hundred stars have been found and there is reason to believe that many smaller stars are hiding in the cluster. The ionized gas around this cluster produces more microwaves than most clusters in our galaxy, making the Dragonfish Nebula the brightest and most massive cluster discovered so far. Due to its distance and location, it is totally invisible in visible light because the interstellar dust absorbs and reddens its light, hiding it. So in order to study it, wavelengths that are not affected, like infrared, are required. Research done with the help of the Spitzer Space Telescope has shown this object has a size of 450 light-years, having a large cavity with a diameter of 100 light-years that was created by the strong stellar winds of the young and massive stars inside it. As of 2011, approximately 400 stars of spectral types O and B have been identified within the nebula. Subsequent studies have confirmed not only at least 15 O-type stars but also 3 luminous blue variable/Wolf–Rayet star candidates. They also have calculated the total mass of the stars associated with the Dragonfish nebula as 105 solar masses, a mass only comparable with that of the super star cluster Westerlund 1, the most massive OB association and the brightest nebula known in our galaxy)

Off to work, vacation is over.................................

Eris is one of the largest known dwarf planets in our solar system. It's about the same size as Pluto but is three times farther from the Sun.

At first, Eris appeared to be larger than Pluto. This triggered a debate in the scientific community that led to the International Astronomical Union's decision in 2006 to clarify the definition of a planet. Pluto, Eris, and other similar objects are now classified as dwarf planets.

Eris was discovered on Jan. 5, 2005, from data obtained on Oct. 21, 2003 during a Palomar Observatory survey of the outer solar system by Mike Brown, a professor of planetary astronomy at the California Institute of Technology; Chad Trujillo of the Gemini Observatory; and David Rabinowitz of Yale University.

Dwarf planet Eris is a member of a group of objects that orbit in a disc-like zone beyond the orbit of Neptune called the Kuiper Belt. This distant realm is populated with thousands of miniature icy worlds, which formed early in the history of our solar system about 4.5 billion years ago

Freedom 7 (or Mercury-Redstone 3, was the first United States human spaceflight, on May 5, 1961, piloted by astronaut Alan Shepard. It was the first crewed flight of Project Mercury. The project had the ultimate objective of putting an astronaut into orbit around the Earth and returning him safely. Shepard's mission was a 15-minute suborbital flight with the primary objective of demonstrating his ability to withstand the high g-forces of launch and atmospheric re-entry. Shepard named his space capsule Freedom 7, setting a precedent for the remaining six Mercury astronauts naming their spacecraft. The number 7 was included in all the crewed Mercury spacecraft names to honor NASA's first group of seven astronauts. His spacecraft reached an altitude of 101.2 nautical miles (116.5 statute miles, 187.5 km) and traveled a downrange distance of 263.1 nautical miles (302.8 statute miles, 487.3 km). It was the fourth Mercury flight launched with the Mercury-Redstone Launch Vehicle, from Cape Canaveral, Florida, close to the Atlantic Ocean. During the flight, Shepard observed the Earth and tested the capsule's attitude control system, turning the capsule around to face its blunt heat shield forward for atmospheric re-entry. He also tested the retrorockets which would return later missions from orbit, though the capsule did not have enough energy to remain in orbit. After re-entry, the capsule landed by parachute on the North Atlantic Ocean off the Bahamas. Shepard and the capsule were picked up by helicopter and brought to U.S. Navy aircraft carrier USS Lake Champlain. The mission was a technical success, though American pride in the accomplishment was dampened by the fact that just three weeks before, the Soviet Union had launched the first human in space, Yuri Gagarin, who completed one orbit on Vostok 1. In 2017 the first National Astronaut Day was held on May 5 to pay tribute to this first U.S. flight)

Calling it a night...........................

The Gould Belt is a local, partial ring of stars in the Milky Way, about 3,000 light-years long, tilted away from the galactic plane by about 16–20 degrees. It contains many O- and B-type stars, amounting to the nearest star-forming regions of the local spiral arm, to which the Sun belongs.

It has recently been largely superseded in definition by the Radcliffe wave and Split linear structures.

The Belt, as formed, and traditionally defined, runs for much less than one tenth of the extent of the local circumference of the galaxy, meaning in galactic coordinates it spans a narrow range of galactic longitudes. The coalescence and/or inception of new stars which cluster within it, nearby, are dated to about 30–50 million years ago. Beyond suspected prior nebulosity of many of the younger stars, and the relative concentration of gas mentioned in the Radcliffe Wave, the factors that have led to the Gould Belt's unbroken nature and concentration are far from fully understood – dark matter has in some leading literature been posited as causatory, in astrophysics, as somehow intrinsic to the high density of recent stellar formation seen. It is named after Benjamin Gould, who identified it in 1879.

The belt contains bright, young stars in many constellations

Helix Nebula ((also known as NGC 7293 or Caldwell 63) is a planetary nebula (PN) located in the constellation Aquarius. Discovered by Karl Ludwig Harding, probably before 1824, this object is one of the closest of all the bright planetary nebulae to Earth The distance, measured by the Gaia mission, is 655±13 light-years. It is similar in appearance to the Cat's Eye Nebula and the Ring Nebula, whose size, age, and physical characteristics are similar to the Dumbbell Nebula, varying only in its relative proximity and the appearance from the equatorial viewing angle. The Helix Nebula has sometimes been referred to as the "Eye of God" in pop culture, as well as the "Eye of Sauron". The Helix Nebula is an example of a planetary nebula, formed by an intermediate to low-mass star, which sheds its outer layers near the end of its evolution. Gases from the star in the surrounding space appear, from our vantage point, as if we are looking down a helix structure. The remnant central stellar core, known as the central star (CS) of the planetary nebula, is destined to become a white dwarf star. The observed glow of the central star is so energetic that it causes the previously expelled gases to brightly fluoresce. The nebula is in the constellation of Aquarius, and lies about 650 light-years away, spanning about 0.8 parsecs (2.5 light-years))

Off to work..............................

The International Astronomical Union (IAU) established a Working Group on Star Names (WGSN) in May 2016 to catalog and standardize proper names for stars for the international astronomical community. It operates under Division C – Education, Outreach and Heritage.

The IAU states that it is keen to make a distinction between the terms name and designation. To the IAU, name refers to the (usually colloquial) term used for a star in everyday conversation, while designation is solely alphanumerical, and used almost exclusively in official catalogues and for professional astronomy. (The WGSN notes that transliterated Bayer designations (e.g., Tau Ceti) are considered a special historical case and are treated as designations

List of IAU-approved Star Names as of January 1st, 2021 (click on headers to sort)