How far back in time is it possible to see? Well, in theory a super telescope could see 46,5 Billion light years away in any direction from Earth according to the existing theory of the expanding universe, this boundary is also known as the Hubble radius or the Hubble sphere. Due to the ongoing expansion of the universe, this boundary is growing in size, allowing us to se father away. But the expansion is not evenly and outside this imaginary boundary, the expansion is accelerating even more, making the light emitted from any stars and galaxies beyond this line, to effetely move away from us. This means that the observable universe will reduce over time.( Up to now the age of the universe is still estimated to be 13.8 Billion years old, allowing us to se the first light of newly born galaxies some 13.5 Bly ago)
Now lets se how far its possible to see with a 8 inch telescope from the Copenhagen area:-)
Andromeda galaxy, a barred spiral galaxy also known as M31 or NGC 224. Distance : 2.3 Mly
M82, the cigar galaxy or NGC 3034 is a starburst galaxy that forms new stars with an exceptional high rate. Note the red hydrogen cloud exhausting from the core. This image was combined/merged together, using 50 x 3 min. of normal exposures and 50 x 3 min. exposures with a H-Alpha/OIII narrowband filter. Distance: 12 Mly
C23, NGC 891 also known as the Silver Silver galaxy, Distance: 35 Mly
Stephan's Quintet is a group of five galaxies, although the foreground galaxy(NGC 7320) is not actually part of the true relationship which connects the other members. NGC 7320 is 40 million light-years away, NGC 7319, NGC 7318 A/B and NGC 7317 is approx. 290 million light-years from Earth .
Deer Lick Group consists of NGC 7335 and NGC 7336, the barred spiral galaxy NGC 7337 and the elliptical galaxy NGC 7340. The foreground 5th. Galaxy NGC 7331 or C30 is approx. 40 Mly away.
Distance for the group members: 332, 365, 348 and 294 million light years.
In the constellation Hercules, we find the galaxy cluster Abell 2151. It consists of about 200 galaxies. Distance: Approx. 1/2 Billion light-years.
Abell 2390 is another galaxy cluster and located in the constellation Pegasus. This cluster counts more than 50.000 galaxies and generates a huge amount of mass, this influences light coming from remote galaxies and stars behind the cluster and creates a unique phenomenon known as “lensing effect” where light are bent and distorted. Using a large telescope like James Webb and Euclid, these lensing effects, can be observed.
Distance: 2.7 billion light-years from mother Earth.........
My ultimate goal is to “collect” clearly visible galaxies more than 4.5 Billion light years away( before Earth even existed)! To achieve this, I think a telescope upgrade is needed ( Maybe you read this Santa:-)...
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