SMC

Another shot of the SMC, this time in colour and with some added Ha. Just to bring out the nebulae along the bar of the galaxy.

Lying some 200Kly (61Kpc) from Earth, the SMC is the second largest of the satellite galaxies that are in orbit (or just passing by) of the Milky Way. It's directly associated with its larger neighbour, the LMC, and both are enveloped in a common neutral Hydrogen cloud. Both are associated with the Magellanic Stream, a large tidal tail of stars and gas which has been stripped from both galaxies by their even larger neighbour.

The SMC contains several hundred million stars and weighs in at around 7 billion solar masses. Meaning there is an appreciable amount of "dark matter" surrounding the galaxy. At 7000ly (2.15Kpc) across, it's appreciably smaller than the LMC and tiny next to the Milky Way.

Like the LMC, the galaxy contains numerous HII regions, the largest and brightest of which is ngc346-N66 (open cluster and associated nebula). Some 200ly (61pc) across, the nebula contains a large open cluster of stars making up an OB association of some 230 stars, 33 of which are O class stars. 11 are as hot as O6.5 or earlier. The youngest stars of the cluster are around 2Ma in age and observations of the cluster point towards continuing high mass star formation occurring.

Within the next several billion years, it's believed that the SMC, along with the LMC, with collide with our galaxy and begin the process of their assimilation into our own galaxy's structure. This is a process that will take on order of a few hundred million to several billion years, depending on the kinematics of the collision. The collision will cause a massive flurry of star formation within our galaxy as the colliding remnants generate massive shockwaves within the gases of both the remnants and our own galaxy.

Pic taken with t10 (iTelescope, SSO), 1.5hours LHaRGB (10x3min L, 6x5min Ha, 5x2min RGB).
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