11 billion year old photons (red shift 2.369) - gravitational arc

[Shiraz]

https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/pdf/2016/06/aa28297-16.pdf

the above paper identified a huge bright gravitational arc down near the SCP so I tried to image it. Local conditions limited the data to a selection of about 12 hours of very variable quality, but there was enough to show this extraordinary object. The arc lensing is so efficient that it is possible to detect photons that have been travelling for most of the life of the universe - they started their journey only ~3 billion years after the big bang and ~7 billion years before the solar system came into being. The source galaxy - if it still exists - is now way across the other side of the universe. It is really exciting and a great privilege to be able to observe photons this ancient and in a way that clearly shows the reality of spacetime warping.

The arc itself has 3 main sections (one quite small) and a fourth segment on the opposite side of the lensing mass - the fourth is not visible on this image. Most interesting is that the source galaxy is now quite blue, so it must have been rich in hard UV to be even visible at redshift >2. The discovery paper also shows blue in false colour near IR, again indicating a UV bias in the spectrum.

The image is cosmetically pretty ghastly - had to dig right down in the bones of the data and found lots of noise. Maybe next year there will be more data:thumbsup: For now though, best fun for a long time.

thanks for looking. Cheers Ray

lum 188x2min
R 56x3min
G 26x3min
B 20x5min
10inch f4, asi1600

upscaled 150%

[Slawomir]

That's awesome Ray :thumbsup:

[Camelopardalis]

Wow what a fascinating piece of treasure you dug up Ray :thumbsup:

[alocky]

This has got to be the coolest thing I've seen! Gravitational lensing in an amateur image.
That's an astonishing result, even if it isn't pretty!

[RickS]

Well done, Ray :thumbsup: That's incredibly cool. Doesn't really look that noisy, but maybe that's more of a reflection on me than the data :lol:

[strongmanmike]

How cool is that :eyepop: nice work....and to think there are people who spend $70K just on an OTA to image and re-image and repro NGC 253, Cen A and Eta Carina :rolleyes:....man!...sheesh, THIS is astro imaging! Awesome :thumbsup:

Mike

[redbeard]

Hi Ray,

Fantastic!

Great effort. :thumbsup:

Cheers,

Damien.

[Shiraz]

Thanks Suavi!


Hi Dunk - this was fun


Thanks Andrew. It was really cool to see the thing develop in the processing and it sure is an astonishing thing.


Thanks Rick. It took a bit of work getting rid of some of the blotchiness, but it is still there.


thanks Mike. yeah, this was fun stuff. Early on, it felt a bit like I was wasting good sky though - the seeing had to be good to get anything useful down so low and some pretty targets were missed.


thanks very much Damien !

[DJT]

Ray, that is very, very cool. Well done :thumbsup:

[Peter Ward]

Love your work. Clever and well executed :thumbsup:

[Atmos]

That is pretty damn awesome Ray!
My mother keeps suggesting that I do what Hubble did and just point my scope at the most unassuming patch of boring sky there is and see what pops up. I figure, why do that when there are gravitational arcs to be had!

It's images like this and the random stuff that Mike and Steve image that really push out of the norm in astro imaging :)

[andyc]

That's brilliant - right up there with Rolf's go at the Einstein ring, and with a 10" scope too! I'm very impressed, that you found out about this, then had the patience to get enough good data. I think it's a lovely image too :D

This object is now on my target list, always wanted to image one of these. I'm actually surprised it's such a recent discovery as it's even visible on the DSS imagery on sky-map.org near IC4555. I guess it's a big sky, lots of places for stuff to hide!

[Retrograde]

This is phenomenal. I never knew you could even image such a thing.
Super impressive Ray!

[Merlin66]

Ray,
Well done!
When I read the heading I thought for a moment you'd come over to the spectroscopy side!
Just earlier this month Robin Leadbeater managed to obtain the first amateur spectrum of such an object. He was using a C11 and a modified (200 l/mm) ALPY spectrograph.
https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/astronomical_spectroscopy/conversations/messages/13865

[leon]

Wow that is so good, fantastic effort indeed.

Leon

[Placidus]

That's so good it hurts. Brilliantly conceived and executed. Just wonderful.

[multiweb]

Top shot Ray. Very interesting project and well done. :thumbsup:

[RobF]

Incredible work Ray. Thanks for sharing.

[Merlin66]

As Robin mentions - The broad UV emission lines from Lyman alpha, Si IV and C IV have been shifted at z =2.4 into the visible.

I agree, these objects make incredible targets for the amateur....

[atalas]

Excellent work Ray :thumbsup:

[Octane]

That is astonishing. Colour me very impressed!

H

[markas]

Marvelous, Ray! Very impressive:thumbsup:

Mark

[rustigsmed]

simply amazing, i had just assumed targets like this were out of range (resolution) for amateurs!

[Stevec35]

That's really impressive Ray!

Steve

[Martin Pugh]

Well done Sir!

cheers
Martin

[GUS.K]

Impressive capture.

[trent_julie]

Absolutely fantastic!

[Shiraz]

thanks David!


Thanks very much Peter


Thanks Colin. maybe your mother is right - perhaps we could all try to image one nondescript spot in the sky and combine our images - who knows what would show.


thanks Andy. its obvious on DSS, but nobody ever looked there - most of the Southern sky is like that and we have a great opportunity to see new things - until the new large synoptic survey scope comes on line in 2022..

Thanks Pete. this one is surprisingly easy to image - it is big and relatively bright.


Naah, did enough spectroscopy of various types before I retired:lol:. Which object did Robin study?


thanks Leon - glad you enjoyed it


thanks M&T - very much appreciated


thanks Marc - it was good fun.


Hi Rob - thanks very much


thanks Ken.


thanks very much Louie.


thanks very much H!


Thank you Mark.


Hi Russ. This one is fairly easy to access, although it is always down pretty low.


thanks a lot Steve - fun looking at different stuff isn't it?


Thanks Martin - appreciate your comment.

cheers Ray

[Merlin66]

Ray,
Robin's object was:
The quadruple gravitationally lensed quasar J014709+463037
Keck telescope published data here
https://arxiv.org/abs/1707.05873

[Shiraz]

thanks Gus!

thanks guys - appreciated.


thanks Ken. interesting that the quasar was at almost the same distance. What I find amazing is that the arc lens was so efficient that a fairly normal starburst galaxy can be seen at that distance - it didn't need the accretion disk/jet associated with a supermassive black hole.

cheers ray

[gregbradley]

That's a first for the amateur community, a gravitational lensing.

I would not have thought it was possible with amateur gear and only Hubble type territory.

Great work.

Greg.

[Merlin66]

Not to knock Ray's excellent work and admirable results, the spectra obtain by Robin I think was the first amateur result on a "gravitation lensed" object.

[Shiraz]

Thanks Greg and Ken - wish it was, but this is not the first

Rolf posted an image on IIS of the arc in Abell2667 circa 2014?

I did the same in 2015 http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=139749 and there are other examples out there.

I think that this one is by far the biggest to date though. cheers

[Merlin66]

Ray,
Thanks for that.
I stand corrected........

[marc4darkskies]

That's just plain awesome Ray ... capturing 11B year old photons! Lots of fodder for contemplation there!

[Andy01]

+1^ :thumbsup:



Yep, truly astonishing!



You've certainly raised the bar with astro imaging science there Ray, certainly not "just a pretty picture!"

Hat's off to you! :prey2:

[Geoff45]

Great stuff Ray. I'd never even thought of going for objects like this. Just goes to show what impressive stuff can be done if you step off the beaten track.
Geoff

[Paul Haese]

You certainly go for the extreme imaging targets Ray. That is ancient light. Made in stars long before that 11 billion years too. I wonder if there are life forms there now?

[Derek Klepp]

An excellent bit of science Ray if it wasn,t explained it reminds me of some of the lens aberrations I get when light enters at a varying angles of differing lenses.

[Shiraz]

Thanks Marcus - the age of this stuff really is something to contemplate isn't it.


Thanks Andy - appreciated


thanks Geoff. after battling for weeks to find enough clear sky at the SCP (which is just above the wall of my obs), i wondered f I should have bothered. When the faint arc began to appear in the integration though, it was all worthwhile


that's a good point Paul - the galaxy itself was a fairly ordinary one, so it must have formed quite a bit earlier still. Blimey.


thanks Derek. Not a very high quality lens, but it is way bigger than the milky way, so quantity stands for something.

Cheers Ray