What is that nebula near the constellation Aries?

Question

When Aries is directly overhead, there is a nebula visible to the north (and just a very little bit west) of it. If you held up your hand at arms length, with the palm just to the north (earth north, of course) of Aries, then the nebula in question would appear to be one and one fourth of a hand's measure (at arms length) away from Aries. (I hope all this makes sense---I'm not all that saavy as to describing degrees, distance, etc. re. celestial objects in relation to each other.) What constellation is that and what nebula?

No, not the Pleiades. That cluster (which looks like a kite with a tail---with a nebula there in the 'tail") is to the east of Aries when Aries is straight up. The nebula, I am speaking of is to the north of Aries when Aries is straight up.

I'm in Texas, and Aries is straight up here at midnight. What I'm seeing is a large "blur" (like a glowing cloud), visible in a cluster of stars just to the north of Aries, say, about 15 to 20 degrees. What IS that!

Answer 1

There's not much there. If you have exceptional eyesight and a dark sky location, you might be seeing M33, the Pinwheel galaxy, which is just north of Aries in Triangulum. Moving north, other possibilites are M31, the Andromeda Galaxy; M34, an open cluster in Perseus; or the Alpha Persei Moving Cluster, centered around Mirfak.

But perhaps the best possibility is that you're seeing Comet Holmes, which is in Perseus right now and quite bright.

Answer 2

Actually, there is a nebula in the Pleades despite what has been said to the contrary.

If you check out any astrophoto it can be seen clearly as a cloud of gas (through which the Pleades is passing) known as a reflection nebula, which is blue in colour and is brightest around the star Merope, but also can be seen around the other stars of that famous cluster. The other nebulae in Taurus is the famous Crab Nebula (M1) and Hinds Variable Nebula (NGC 1554-5) but all of these are very faint and not likely to be seen by the naked eye which does not resolve colours in faint surface brightness objects like nebulae.

More importantly though, the perceived nebula is said to be north west of the constellation Aries, Taurus is south east of it. I would venture to say that it could well be the Andromeda Galaxy (M31) which is in the constellation Andromeda. Under good conditions it is easily visible to the naked eye. It looks like a hazy elongated faint mist of light but is in fact the closest galaxy to us (2.5m light years) and is NW of the constellation of Aires as described (by the invisible man) but the not near the Pleades.

Unfortunately the location given in the question is not very clear but good enough to easily come to that conclusion. Well done the Invisible Man for spotting it!, if that's what you saw

You should get 10 points for that.

Just hope I'm right about what you saw.

Answer 3

Aries The Constellation

Answer 4

What you're describing is most likely Comet Holmes located next to the bright star Mirfak in the constellation Perseus, but could also be the Andromeda Galaxy in the constellation Andromeda. Both fit your description fairly well. Comet Holmes is slightly brighter than the Andromeda Galaxy and spherical in shape, while the Andromeda Galaxy is slightly fainter and elliptical in shape, as seen with low power binoculars.

Answer 5

Thats due to the fact that there is no Nebulae in Andromeda - what was supposed for a long time to be one actually turned out to be the Andromeda Galaxy

Answer 6

This festively colorful nebula, called NGC 604, is one of the largest known seething cauldrons of star birth seen in a nearby galaxy. NGC 604 is similar to familiar star-birth regions in our Milky Way galaxy, such as the Orion Nebula, but it is vastly larger in extent and contains many more recently formed stars. This monstrous star-birth region contains more than 200 brilliant blue stars within a cloud of glowing gases some 1,300 light-years across, nearly 100 times the size of the Orion Nebula.

Answer 7

"That" is most likely the comet Holmes. It's been an inauspicious short period comet for a long time, but for some reason it puffed out gas last October, which has created a large coma, causing the comet to brighten by a factor of almost a million.

Name: 17P Holmes
Object type:short period comet
Semimajor axis: 3.6174 AU
Eccentricity: 0.43242
Inclination: 19.113 degrees
Longitude of ascending node: 326.867 degrees
Argument of perihelion: 24.259 degrees
Time of perihelion : JD 2454225.0 (12h UT, 4 May 2007)
Perihelion distance: 2.0532 AU
Orbital period: 2513 days

Holmes was closest to Earth on November 4th, when it was 1.6147 AU from us.

Here's an ephemeris for Holmes that I generated from the above orbital elements.

Year = 2007...
DATE, distance, right ascension, declination
12nov, 1.622 AU, 3h 28m 47s, +50d 26' 35"
13nov, 1.623 AU, 3h 27m 33s, +50d 23' 50"
14nov, 1.626 AU, 3h 26m 20s, +50d 20' 42"
15nov, 1.628 AU, 3h 25m 06s, +50d 17' 13"
16nov, 1.630 AU, 3h 23m 52s, +50d 13' 23"
17nov, 1.633 AU, 3h 22m 41s, +50d 09' 13"
18nov, 1.636 AU, 3h 21m 29s, +50d 04' 42"
19nov, 1.640 AU, 3h 20m 18s, +49d 59' 51"
20nov, 1.643 AU, 3h 19m 08s, +49d 54' 40"
25nov, 1.664 AU, 3h 13m 33s, +49d 24' 15"
01dec, 1.697 AU, 3h 07m 40s, +48d 39' 03"
15dec, 1.808 AU, 2h 58m 32s, +46d 30' 05"

Year = 2008...
DATE, distance, right ascension, declination
01jan, 1.997 AU, 2h 57m 02s, +43d 44' 36"
15jan, 2.190 AU, 3h 02m 54s, +41d 45' 12"
01feb, 2.455 AU, 3h 16m 41s, +39d 52' 28"
15feb, 2.690 AU, 3h 32m 04s, +38d 45' 11"
01mar, 2.948 AU, 3h 51m 28s, +37d 53' 12"
15mar, 3.188 AU, 4h 11m 30s, +37d 17' 37"

For reference, the position of Alpha Persei, or Mirfak, is
RA = 3h 24m, dec = +49d 52'

Holmes is not one of those objects that can hit Earth. The smallest distance that their orbits approach each other is 1.0589 AU, with a heliocentric ecliptic longitude of 342.94 degrees for Earth and 343.36 degrees for Holmes.

Answer 8

You may be seeing the comet that is located near the constellation perseus. It is the one that has been in the news, it exploded (maybe during the late summer) and therefore has no tail, it just looks like a huge cloudy shape with a slightly brighter center.

Answer 9

Possibly the Andromeda galaxy. I know it can be seen readily with naked eye, and I've seen it in dark skies. I'm 34 degrees south and it's never higher than quite low in the northern sky from here. Your description matches how I remember it in relation to Aries.

Get the binoculars onto it. It looks great.

Answer 10

You are probably seeing the Pleiades star cluster, which is of course a star cluster and not a nebula. Look closely, they say you can make out 6 of its stars with your naked eye. Look at it through binoculars and you can see more of it's individual stars.