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Old 21-07-2021, 07:18 AM
Dennis
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Dwarf Planet Quaoar

Here is an image of the Dwarf Planet Quaoar (mag 18.88) taken from our back yard in Brisbane on 19th July. (120x30 sec Lum and 30x30 sec RGB).

Quaoar is a planetoid that lies beyond Pluto's orbit in the solar system. Quaoar was discovered on June 4th, 2002 by astronomers Chad Trujillo and Michael Brown of the California Institute of Technology, using images that were obtained with the Samuel Oschin Telescope at Palomar Observatory. The discovery was announced on October 7th, 2002, at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society. At the time, the object was designated as 2002 LM60, but would soon be renamed by Brown and Caltech his team.

Quaoar lurks in the Kuiper Belt, a group of icy objects beyond Neptune. It is about 42 astronomical units, or Earth-sun distances, away. That's about 4 billion miles (6 billion km) — a billion kilometers more distant than Neptune. It takes about 288 years for Quaoar to go once around the sun in a roughly circular orbit.

Quaoar has only one moon, called Weywot. it orbits around Quaoar at an approximate 9000 mile distance.
The attached screen capture from The Sky X Pro shows the field around Quaoar (red square) and I have also attached a screen capture from Astrometry.Net.

From SkyTools 4.
(50000) Quaoar
Minor Planet, Dwarf Planet
R.A. 18h17m30.4s Dec. -15°13'40" (2000) in Serpens Cauda
Magnitude: 18.88
Orbit Period: 288.3 years
Diameter: 590 - 1900 km
Current Status:
Earth Distance: 41.9 AU
Total motion: 2.66 "/hr PA 264.0°

Image Details:
Centre (RA, hms): 18h 17m 35.243s
Centre (Dec, dms): -15° 13' 27.770"
FOV: 9.8 x 7.35 arcmin
Pixel scale: 0.459 arcsec/pixel

NASA's New Horizons spacecraft observations of Kuiper Belt object Quaoar ("Kwa-war"), which - at 690 miles or 1,100 kilometers in diameter - is roughly half the size of Pluto. See link below.
https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/resources/400/quaoar/

Wikipedia link:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/50000_Quaoar

Animation of the discovery images:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/50000_..._animation.gif

Cheers

Dennis
Attached Thumbnails
Click for full-size image (Quaoar Raw.jpg)
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Click for full-size image (Quaoar Text.jpg)
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Click for full-size image (Quaoar Box.jpg)
169.5 KB92 views
Click for full-size image (The Sky X Pro Stars mag.jpg)
61.5 KB100 views
Click for full-size image (Astrometry Results.jpg)
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Old 21-07-2021, 08:15 AM
Tropo-Bob (Bob)
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That is amazing. Never in my lifetime did I think that I would see such an image from a 'backyard' astronomer. Thanks, that's great!!!
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Old 21-07-2021, 08:41 AM
Dave882 (David)
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Incredible shots. Brilliant research and execution!!
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Old 21-07-2021, 09:24 AM
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h0ughy (David)
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Amazing that you go for something so bright!! Your are a gifted man, fantastic research and dedication
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Old 21-07-2021, 10:45 AM
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multiweb (Marc)
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Far out Dennis...
And I'm struggling finding Pluto.
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Old 21-07-2021, 11:49 AM
Dennis
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Thanks Bob, David, David and Marc, I appreciate your comments.

The truth be known, all I did was <click> on Quaoar in The Sky X Pro and then <Click> Slew and the telescope and ASI 290 MM Pro did all the hard work.

Cheers

Dennis
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Old 21-07-2021, 03:36 PM
beren
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Brilliant Dennis
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Old 21-07-2021, 06:49 PM
Dennis
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Quote:
Originally Posted by beren View Post
Brilliant Dennis
Thanks Stuart - I guess that I should set up tonight and image the same area again, just to make sure that it wasn't a hot pixel...

Larger chip cameras such as the ASI 294 MM Pro and apps like PixInsight have breathed new life into the hobby for me, compared to my old SBIG ST7 and CCDSoft days.

Cheers

Dennis
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Old 22-07-2021, 05:01 PM
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theodog (Jeff)
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Love your work Dennis.
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Old 22-07-2021, 06:31 PM
Dennis
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Originally Posted by theodog View Post
Love your work Dennis.
Thanks Jeff, I appreciate your comments.

Wonderful to have such a rewarding hobby.

Cheers

Dennis
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Old 23-07-2021, 06:49 AM
N1 (Mirko)
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Incredible. Well done!
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Old 25-07-2021, 12:41 PM
Dennis
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Quaoar Combined 19th and 24th July.

On the 19th July, having recorded what a few specks of light that I figured was a good candidate for the Dwarf Planet Quaoar, I decided to follow this up on the next clear night to see if I could capture its movement against the background stars. This turned out to be 24th July with a nearby Full Moon.

Having to contend not only with the light pollution of suburban Brisbane, I also suffered the insult of a nearby Full Moon. When combined with the real motion of Quaoar against the BG stars, I did not know if I would be able to capture the faint, mag 18.88 “smeared” path of Quaoar over the duration of the captures, compared to the more static locations of the fixed BG stars.

Here is a combined image from the 19th and 24th July showing Quaoar, along with a couple of zoomed in screen captures from The Sky X Pro showing the predicted positions for those nights.

Centre of image:
RA: 18h 17m 25.029s
Dec: -15° 14' 32.383"
FOV Size: 12.2 x 9.18 arcmin
Pixel scale: 0.459 arcsec/pixel
Orientation: Up is 359 degrees E of N

Cheers

Dennis
Attached Thumbnails
Click for full-size image (Quaoar 19th and 24th Rot 90 CCW Crop 1280 Raw BG.jpg)
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Click for full-size image (Quaoar 19th and 24th Rot 90 CCW Crop 1280 Quaoar Circles.jpg)
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Click for full-size image (Quaoar 19th and 24th Rot 90 CCW Crop 1280 All Text.jpg)
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Click for full-size image (Quaoar 19th and 24th Rot 90 CCW Crop 1280 TSX Frames.jpg)
188.8 KB29 views
Click for full-size image (TSX Pro 19 July 2021.jpg)
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Click for full-size image (TSX Pro 24 July 2021.jpg)
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