Andromeda

Andromeda

The constellation of Andromeda is a heroine in a grand Greek myth of the ancient Ethiopean dynasty. Almost all fields in autumn skies are occupied by characters in this story, Andromeda, Cassiopeia, Perseus, Pegasus, Cepheus, and Cetus.
The asterism consists of several bright stars with magnitudes of about 2, and there is a splendid galaxy of M31, The Andromeda Galaxy, at the side of Princess Andromeda. It could be said that the galaxy makes the name of this constellation popular.

I think you know at least the name of this Galaxy even if you don't gaze at stars habitually, it's a Messier's object representative of the night sky in autumn. M31 is only one celestial body recognized as a non-stellar object before the telescope was invented.
M31 has a size of 190' x 60', it's larger than six times of that of the Moon. The Galaxy lies at about a fifteen-degree angle from being edge-on, and it has a bright oval nucleus, a dust lane become visible in medium-sized telescopes. Its distance is approximately 2.3 million light years.

The brighter and closer elliptical companion of the Andromeda galaxy, also known as NGC 221. This is the inner half of a V-band CCD image taken in twilight (15 seconds' exposure) at the prime focus of the 4-meter Mayall telescope of Kitt Peak National Observatory. North is at the top and east to the left, for direct comparison with a chart or eyepiece view. The center of M31 is to the north. This area subtends 7.3 arcminutes, and is shown with a logarithmic intensity mapping. Even so, the bright nucleus of M32 (probably the highest stellar density known in the entire Local Group) saturates the display.

This picture of the Andromeda Galaxy's companion Messier 110 is a color composite of CCD images from the 0.9-meter telescope of the Kitt Peak National Observatory, near Tucson, Arizona. The peculiar dark structures, very probably dust clouds, are clearly visible in this short exposure image; due to these structures, M110 is often classified as E5p or E6p. Because of its small (linear) size, this galaxy is usually counted as a dwarf spheroidal or dwarf elliptical rather than a normal elliptical galaxy.

NGC752 is a very scattered open cluster found around the left leg of Princess Andromeda. The cluster is positioned near the boundary on Triangulum, can be easily detected only with the naked eyes looks like a dimmed nebula.
The cluster has an apparent diameter of 45 arc minutes, so telescopes aren't suitable for appreciating this object. You'll be fascinated with the cluster by using of binoculars that shows you plenty of fine stars appeared on the dimmed light.
NGC752 has formed a vast triangle in the autumnal night skies with the Andromeda Galaxy (M31) and M33 in Triangulum. You shouldn't forget to appreciate NGC752 after enjoying these splendid galaxies.

NGC891 is a small galaxy in Andromeda, positioned at about 4 degrees east of gamma Andromedae. The galaxy is being edge-on with clearly distinguished dust-lane in large telescopes. NGC891 has a length of 13-arc minutes and visual magnitude of about 10, it's fairly hard to detect its spindle shape with naked eyes.
The galaxy can hardly be paid attention because the constellation has a representative object of The Andromeda galaxy (M31) in autumn skies.

NGC7662 is a small planetary nebula in northern region of Andromeda. You can find out it about 3 degrees west of iota Andromedae, which forms the tip of her right arm. The nebula has a diameter of about 30 arc seconds and a visual brightness of about 9th magnitude.
NGC7662 has a round shape, but this image shows you the nebula has non-even brightness. The beautiful bluish color is one of characteristics of NGC7662, and the nebula has an unique nickname of "The Blue Snowball". A good seeing condition will allow you to appreciate the impressive bluish shape through medium-sized telescopes. It's estimated that the nebula is about 1800 light years away.

NGC 7640 is a barred spiral galaxy in Andromeda. A rough distance estimate for NGC 7640 is 19 Million Light Years, and at that distance its true diameter would be about 59,240 light years.

Planetary Destinations In Andromeda

Upsilon Andromedae Planetary System

Astronomers recently announced the detection of three large planets orbiting the star Upsilon Andromedae - the first planetary system known to orbit a normal star other than our Sun. These planets were not directly photographed but found through a Doppler technique developed to use large telescopes to search nearby stars for wobbling planetary signatures. However, Upsilon And itself is visible to the unaided eye shining in Earth's sky in the northern constellation Andromeda at about 4th magnitude.