22-884: NGC 2264 is the designation number of the New General Catalogue that identifies two astronomical objects as a single object: the Cone Nebula , and the Christmas Tree Cluster. Two other objects are within this designation but not officially included, the Snowflake Cluster , and the Fox Fur Nebula . All of the objects are located in the Monoceros constellation and are located about 720 parsecs or 2,300 light-years from Earth . Due to its relative proximity and large size, it
44-518: A supplement to the NGC, and contains an additional 5,386 objects, collectively known as the IC objects. It summarizes the discoveries of galaxies, clusters and nebulae between 1888 and 1907, most of them made possible by photography . A list of corrections to the IC was published in 1912. The Revised New Catalogue of Nonstellar Astronomical Objects (abbreviated as RNGC ) was compiled by Sulentic and Tifft in
66-557: A color map filled with varying wavelengths . As seen in the photographs taken by the Spitzer Space telescope , we are able to differentiate between young red stars and older blue stars. With varying youthful stars comes vast changes to the overall structure of the clusters and nebula . For a cluster to be considered a Snowflake, it must remain in the original location the star was formed. When referring to this emission nebula overall, there are several aspects that contribute to
88-748: A second supplement to the General Catalogue , but the Royal Astronomical Society asked Dreyer to compile a new version instead. This led to the publication of the New General Catalogue in the Memoirs of the Royal Astronomical Society in 1888. Assembling the NGC was a challenge, as Dreyer had to deal with many contradictory and unclear reports made with a variety of telescopes with apertures ranging from 2 to 72 inches. While he did check some himself,
110-548: Is 301 objects (2.3%). The brightest star in this catalogue is NGC 771 with magnitude of 4.0. NGC 2000.0 (also known as the Complete New General Catalog and Index Catalog of Nebulae and Star Clusters ) is a 1988 compilation of the NGC and IC made by Roger W. Sinnott, using the J2000.0 coordinates. It incorporates several corrections and errata made by astronomers over the years. The NGC/IC Project
132-560: Is an astronomical catalogue of deep-sky objects compiled by John Louis Emil Dreyer in 1888. The NGC contains 7,840 objects, including galaxies , star clusters and emission nebulae . Dreyer published two supplements to the NGC in 1895 and 1908, known as the Index Catalogues (abbreviated IC ), describing a further 5,386 astronomical objects. Thousands of these objects are best known by their NGC or IC numbers, which remain in widespread use. The NGC expanded and consolidated
154-563: Is extremely well-studied. NGC 2264 is sometimes referred to as the Christmas Tree Cluster and the Cone Nebula . However, the designation of NGC 2264 in the New General Catalogue refers to both objects and not the cluster alone. In December 2023, NASA released Christmas holiday-related images by the James Webb Space Telescope , including the Christmas Tree Galaxy Cluster and others. NGC 2264
176-764: Is the location where the Cone Nebula, the Stellar Snowflake Cluster and the Christmas Tree Cluster have formed in this emission nebula . For reference, the Stellar Snowflake Cluster is located 2,700 light years away in the constellation Monoceros. The Snowflake Cluster was granted its name due to its unmistakable pinwheel-like shape and its assortment of bright colors. The Christmas Tree star formation consists of young stars obscured by heavy layers of dust clouds. These dust clouds, along with hydrogen and helium are producing luminous new stars. The combination of dense clouds and an array of colors creates
198-611: The Leviathan of Parsonstown telescope). During 1878 he moved to Dunsink , the site of the Trinity College Observatory of Dublin University to work for Robert Stawell Ball . In 1882 he relocated again, this time to Armagh Observatory , where he served as Director until his retirement in 1916. In 1885 he became a British citizen. In 1916 he and his wife Kate moved to Oxford where Dreyer worked on editing
220-606: The NGC/IC Project in 1993. A Revised New General Catalogue and Index Catalogue (abbreviated as RNGC/IC) was compiled in 2009 by Wolfgang Steinicke and updated in 2019 with 13,957 objects. The original New General Catalogue was compiled during the 1880s by John Louis Emil Dreyer using observations from William Herschel and his son John , among others. Dreyer had already published a supplement to Herschel's General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters (GC), containing about 1,000 new objects. In 1886, he suggested building
242-542: The 18th and 19th centuries". It found that one of the 229—NGC 1498—was not actually in the sky. Five others were duplicates of other entries, 99 existed "in some form", and the other 124 required additional research to resolve. As another example, reflection nebula NGC 2163 in Orion was classified "non-existent" due to a transcription error by Dreyer. Dreyer corrected his own mistake in the Index Catalogues, but
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#1732798791695264-583: The Navy. When he was 14 he became interested in astronomy and regularly visited Hans Schjellerup at the Copenhagen observatory. He was educated in Copenhagen, taking an MA in 1872. While the same university later awarded him a PhD, in 1874. But in 1874, at the age of 22, he went to Parsonstown , Ireland . There he worked as the assistant of Lord Rosse (the son and successor of the Lord Rosse who built
286-490: The RNGC preserved the original error, and additionally reversed the sign of the declination, resulting in NGC 2163 being classified as non-existent. The Revised New General Catalogue and Index Catalogue (abbreviated as RNGC/IC ) is a compilation made by Wolfgang Steinicke in 2009. It is a comprehensive and authoritative treatment of the NGC and IC catalogues. The number of objects with status of "not found" in this catalogue
308-427: The RNGC. The designation is applied to objects which are duplicate catalogue entries, those which were not detected in subsequent observations, and a number of objects catalogued as star clusters which in subsequent studies were regarded as coincidental groupings. A 1993 monograph considered the 229 star clusters called non-existent in the RNGC. They had been "misidentified or have not been located since their discovery in
330-604: The cataloguing work of William and Caroline Herschel , and John Herschel 's General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars . Objects south of the celestial equator are catalogued somewhat less thoroughly, but many were included based on observation by John Herschel or James Dunlop . The NGC contained multiple errors, but attempts to eliminate them were made by the Revised New General Catalogue (RNGC) by Jack W. Sulentic and William G. Tifft in 1973, NGC2000.0 by Roger W. Sinnott in 1988, and
352-473: The early 1970s, and was published in 1973, as an update to the NGC. The work did not incorporate several previously published corrections to the NGC data (including corrections published by Dreyer himself), and introduced some new errors. For example, the well-known compact galaxy group Copeland Septet in the Leo constellation appears as non-existent in the RNGC. Nearly 800 objects are listed as "non-existent" in
374-647: The objects. John Louis Emil Dreyer John Louis Emil Dreyer (13 February 1852 – 14 September 1926), also Johan Ludvig Emil Dreyer , was a Danish astronomer who spent most of his career working in Ireland. He spent the last decade of his life in Oxford, England . Dreyer was born in Copenhagen . His father, Lieutenant General John Christopher Dreyer, was the Danish Minister for War and
396-401: The prominent configuration of a snowflake and/or Christmas tree cluster. There is a diverse arrangement of brilliant colors, and an evolving process of structure that follow star formation in a nebula. The ratio of brown dwarfs to stars is between 1 to 2.5 and 1 to 7.5. New General Catalogue The New General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars (abbreviated NGC )
418-667: The sheer number of objects meant Dreyer had to accept them as published by others for the purpose of his compilation. The catalogue contained several errors, mostly relating to position and descriptions, but Dreyer referenced the catalogue, which allowed later astronomers to review the original references and publish corrections to the original NGC. The first major update to the NGC is the Index Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars (abbreviated as IC ), published in two parts by Dreyer in 1895 (IC I, containing 1,520 objects) and 1908 (IC II, containing 3,866 objects). It serves as
440-867: The works of Tycho Brahe . He won the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society in 1916 and served as the society's president from 1923 until 1925. He died on 14 September 1926 in Oxford, where he is buried in Wolvercote Cemetery . A crater on the far side of the Moon is named after him. Dreyer compiled the New General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars , basing it on William Herschel 's Catalogue of Nebulae , as well as two supplementary Index Catalogues . The NGC and IC catalogue designations are still widely used. Dreyer
462-540: Was a collaboration among professional and amateur astronomers formed by Steve Gottlieb in 1990, although Steve Gottlieb already started to observe and record NGC objects as early as 1979. Other primary team members were Harold G. Corwin Jr., Malcolm Thomson, Robert E. Erdmann and Jeffrey Corder. The project was completed by 2017. This project identified all NGC and IC objects, corrected mistakes, collected images and basic astronomical data and checked all historical data related to
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#1732798791695484-476: Was also a historian of astronomy. In 1890 he published a biography of Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe , and in his later years he edited Tycho's publications and unpublished correspondence. These were published in a 15-volume edition, Opera Omnia , the last volume of which was published after his death. His book History of the Planetary Systems from Thales to Kepler (1905), is currently printed with
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