This peculiarly shaped nebular complex surrounded by multiple HII regions including NGC 261 and NGC 267 is located in the Western side of the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC). While its angular diameter is of about 8 arc.min, since it is physically bound to the SMC the linear size of the region is of about 465 ly while the side of the image is of linear size of about 1 kly at that distance. Due to its apparently twisted shape we call it a “little spindle” here despite its impressive linear size. The nebula is comprised of at least 5 overlapping bubbles associated with supernova remnants [1-5] with one more supernova remnant candidate [6] also identified by the Simbad Database for which the bubble either already dissipated or obscured by the rest of the structures.
An attempt on decomposition of the 5 overlapping bubbles (numbered as 1, 3-6) is shown in the manually annotated cropped image below (the placement of the SNR candidate [6] us indicated by the dashed circle numbered as 2 and the suggested obscured portions of the bubbles are also shown by dashed lines):
The “roof” of the nebula complex located at the top of the “spindle” is composed of an elaborate collection of shock fronts for which the origin is not so easily traced. The image shows the unprecedented level of detail on this target,making that collection of the shock fronts an attractive target for imaging with large aperture instruments.
Data and initial calibration/integration: Alexandr Zaytsev
https://www.astrobin.com/users/m57ring/ASA Ritchey-Chretien RC-1000: D=1m, f/6.8 on alt-azimuthal direct drive fork mount, FLI ProLine 16803 with secondary mirror based motorized focusing and automatic de-rotation (Telescope #1 system of ChileScope observatory, Río Hurtado Valley, Chile).
12x Ha + 8x OIII + 8x SII guided 600 sec exposures (4h 40min of combined integral) collected over 7 imaging sessions carried out on Dec 20, 21, 23 of 2022 (Ha and OIII) and Jul 22, 23, 27, 28 of 2023 (SII only) using Chilescope Telescope #1 system. Due to a significant time gap between acquiring Ha and OIII data and acquiring SII data each set of exposures was calibrated with calibration data from its respective time period.
Image Processing: Mark Hanson
https://www.hansonastronomy.comEnjoy, Mark and Alex
[1]
https://simbad.cds.unistra.fr/simbad/sim-id?Ident=%403249111&Name=SNR%20B0045-73.3&submit=submit[2]
https://simbad.cds.unistra.fr/simbad/sim-id?Ident=%403249112&Name=SNR%20B0045-73.4&submit=submit[3]
https://simbad.cds.unistra.fr/simbad/sim-id?Ident=%4014954810&Name=MCSNR%20J0047-7309&submit=submit[4]
https://simbad.cds.unistra.fr/simbad/sim-id?Ident=%408261891&Name=%5bBMD2010%5d%20SNR%20J0047.7-7310&submit=submit[5]
https://simbad.cds.unistra.fr/simbad/sim-id?Ident=%403249129&Name=%5bFBR2002%5d%20J004806-730842&submit=submit[6]
https://simbad.cds.unistra.fr/simbad/sim-id?Ident=%403248669&Name=MCRX%20J0047.5-7308&submit=submit
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