Sh2-240, the Spaghetti Nebula

Sh2-240, the Spaghetti Nebula, is a supernova remnant. The nebulous area has an almost spherical shell and a filamentary structure. The remnant has an apparent diameter of approximately 3 degrees or 6 Full Moons on the sky. It is the result of the death of a massive star that formed a neutron star at the end of its life. (APOD 4/25/2016)).

The nebula, although expansive in the sky is incredibly dim and thus required an exposure of over 21 hours to produce this image.

This image is a narrowband image, (HO). It enhances the nebulas contribution of H-alpha and OIII. SII exposures were also taken but not used in this image. The SII contribution essentially mirrors the Ha. Also the SII wavelength (672 nm) is very close to the H-alpha wavelength of (656.28 nm). So, I left the SII contribution out to preserve the color.

The table below shows the RGB channel assignment as follows:

Channel --> Narrowband

Red --> H-alpha

Green --> OIII

Blue --> OIII

Stars were produced from the Ha and OIII channels.

The purpose of this Narrowband image is to show the composition of the planetary nebula. Essentially where hydrogen and oxygen are distributed in the nebula.

Image processed by Andrew F. Macica, original data from Telescope Live.

Imaging Details:

Observatory: IC Astronomy Observatory, Spain

Telescope: Takahashi FSQ-106EDX4

Aperture: 106 mm (4.17 inches), f/3.6

Focal Length: 382 mm w/ .73 field flattener

Camera: FLI ProLine PL16803 CCD

Filters: Ha, OIII

Total Exposure: 21 hours 30 minutes

Image Processing:

PixInsight 1.8.9-3 Ripley (x64);

BlurXTerminator, NoiseXTerminator, StarXTerminator (RC Astro);

Adobe Photoshop 25.12.4;

Adobe Lightroom Classic 15.0.1

Instruction on PixInsight from Adam Block Studios.