Jupiter, Aldebaran and the Hyades: a colorful spot in the sky – 28 Jan. 2025.
This beautiful image shows the bright planet Jupiter and the ruby Aldebaran, with plenty of blue stars from the Hyades.
Jupiter, Aldebaran and the Hyades: 28 Jan. 2025.
The image above comes from the average of five, 120-second exposures, remotely taken with the Samyang 135+Paramount ME+ZWO ASI 6200MC Pro robotic unit available as part of the Virtual Telescope Project facility in Manciano, Italy.
The very bright planet Jupiter dominates the scene, shining against a very rich star field: we are close to the path of the Milky Way, hence such an outstanding star density, with many clouds of dust, too.
Below, we can admire the amazing ruby hue of Aldebaran, the brightest star (Alpha) in Taurus, the Bull, one of the famous Zodiac constellations.
Aldebaran is a red giant, placed at 65 light years from the Earth. Its name means “the Follower” in Arabic, as it rises after the Pleiades, giving the idea it is following them. This red star marks the eye of the Bull, which snout is well represented by the V-shaped Hyades, the closest open star cluster in our sky. It is worth noting that, while Aldebaran shares the same spot of the sky as the Hyades, the cluster is at 153 light years from us, so their proximity is mere perspective, with the objects simply showing along the same line of sight. The cluster shows many blue stars, like diamonds all around the dazzling ruby, Aldebaran.
A couple more star clusters are also visibile: on the upper left corner, we see NGC 1746, while on the right of both Jupiter and Aldebaran we spot NGC 1647.
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