Hubble image archive

NICMOS Image of HR 8799 Planetary System

This is an image of the star HR 8799 taken by Hubble's Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer (NICMOS) in 1998. A mask within the camera (coronagraph) blocks most of the light from the star. In addition, software has been used to digitally subtract more starlight. Nev...

Date
Jan 1, 2011
Mission
Hubble Space Telescope
Archive ID
hubblesite-images-2011-29-2900-image
By

This is an image of the star HR 8799 taken by Hubble's Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer (NICMOS) in 1998. A mask within the camera (coronagraph) blocks most of the light from the star. In addition, software has been used to digitally subtract more starlight. Nevertheless, scattered light from HR 8799 dominates the image, obscuring the faint planets.

Credits

NASA, ESA, and R. Soummer (STScI)

Image Details

About The Object
Object NameHR 8799
Object DescriptionStar with planets
R.A. Position23h 7m 28.65s
Dec. Position21° 8' 3.69"
ConstellationPegasus
Distance130 light-years or 40 parsecs
About The Data
Data DescriptionThe original NICMOS data were from the HST proposal : E. Becklin (University of California, Los Angeles) et al. The science team comprises: R. Soummer, B. Hagan, and A. Rajan (STScI), L. Pueyo and A. Thormann (JHU), and C. Marois (Herzberg Institute of Astrophysics, Victoria).
InstrumentHST>NICMOS/NIC2
Exposure DatesOctober 30, 1998, Exposure Time: 20 minutes
FiltersF160W
About The Image
Color InfoThis image was originally black and white and recorded only overall brightness. These brightness values were translated into a range of arbitrary colors. Such color "maps" can be useful in helping to distinguish subtly varying brightness in an image.

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