ABELL 72 (AKA PK 59-18.1) 

 PLANETARY NEBULA IN DELPHINUS  

(Image centered at: ra 20 h:51 m / dec + 13º 39')

August 2022, Home Backyard in Martínez, Buenos Aires, Argentina

DATA

TYPE: Planetary Nebula

APPARENT DIAMETER: 2,2 x 2 arc minutes

APPARENT MAGNITUDE (V): 16 (mag)

DISTANCE: 3700 light years 

IMAGE INFORMATION

INSTRUMENT: 8" ORION OPTICS UK (Ultra Grade Optics) w/Televue Paracorr working at at f5,75

CAMERA: QSI 583 WS

MOUNT: SKY WATCHER NEQ6, OAG with Starlight Xpress Lodestar

FILTERS: Baader LRGB Set Astronomik O3 filter

SKY CONDITIONS: urban skies - Bortle 8

EXPOSURES: LOIIIRGB (40,180,40,40,40)

OBJECT DESCRIPTION AND IMAGE SESSION

The planetary nebula Abell 72 (PK 59-18.1) was discovered in 1955 by the American astronomer George Ogden Abell on the photo plates of the “Palomar Observatory Sky Survey” (POSS). In the year 1955 he published a first list of 13 globular clusters and the positions of 73 planetary nebulae. The nebula is very faint for the Bortle 8 skies in Martinez although relative large and some details of the internal structure came up. Abell 72 is expanding its glowing shell structure of ionized gas ejected from an old red giant