32 ASTRONOMY • FEBRUARY 2018
The Large Magellanic Cloud, the Milky Way’s
largest satellite galaxy, contains a vast number of
deep-sky gems. To observe them best, however, you
must venture deep into the Southern Hemisphere.
text and images by Don Goldman and Josep Drudis
Explore the LMC
THE LARGE MAGELLANIC CLOUD
(LMC) is the largest and most produc-
tive star-forming region in our galaxy’s
neighborhood. With the image above, we
wanted to emphasize the various supergi-
ant shells, emission nebulae, supernova
remnants, Wolf-Rayet bubbles, and new
star formation surrounding the LMC.
We accomplished this with 32 hours and
10 minutes of exposures through narrow-
band filters to enhance detail and 11 hours
and 50 minutes through RGB filters to
accurately reproduce the star colors.
The data for this four-panel mosaic was
acquired with a Takahashi TOA130 refrac-
tor and super-reducer, providing a focal
length of 760 mm at f/5.8 and a field of
