Radio Galaxy Zoo Talk

something I shold point out?

  • paulbelluscio by paulbelluscio

    Hi everyone!

    I'm fairly new to this but I've spotted something a little bit weird. Look at this picture, the big bright ball in the middle, slightly to the left. It appears that the smaller bills of light surrounding it have a bit of pattern, and could even be connected too.

    A random pattern, something else or is it worth pointing out?
    Thanks!!

    Posted

  • JeanTate by JeanTate in response to paulbelluscio's comment.

    Welcome to RGZ, paulbelluscio! 😃

    The background in images like this comes from the WISE mission; it's an image taken in the infrared. Usually, bright balls are stars. One way to see what's there, in the sky, is to look at the same part of it in 'the optical' (the word astronomers use to describe that part of the electromagnetic spectrum ~the same as what our eyes 'see'); here it is, from the SDSS:

    enter image description here

    To me, the pattern of smaller balls around the bigger one, in the WISE image, is a chance alignment of stars and faint galaxies, around a bright, foreground star.

    Hope this helps, and happy hunting! 😄

    Posted

  • 42jkb by 42jkb scientist, admin in response to JeanTate's comment.

    Hi Paulbelluscio and welcome. Good question and I'm glad you asked. As JeanTate has mentioned this is the pattern of a bright star that was captured by the infrared observations with WISE.

    Posted