Owl Nebula is approximately 8000 years old. The central star of the nebula has brightness about 14 magnitude and mass about 55% solar mass, but is much brighter and its surface temperature is 123000K. The nebula itself holds about 13% solar masses of the matter and its main components are hydrogen, helium, nitrogen, oxygen and suphur. It is typical planetary nebula placed about 2000 light years away.
M108 is very different object – barred spiral galaxy that is seen almost edge-on. This galaxy is knows as quite active one – there are 83 X-ray sources identified there, and there are also a massive black hole in the center. Its mass is estimated to 24 million solar masses. The distance to this galaxy is estimated for 45 million light years, so twenty thousands times far away than Owl Nebula. And this galaxy is really ugly, isn’t it?
And what about the Far? There is one in the frame, small galaxy cluster about 800 million light years away, but still you can recognize some spiral structure of the largest member of this cluster. Other ones are apparently pretty small (how small galaxy can be? )
Clear skies!
