Astr110 Photography Projects, Spring 2005

Kemble's Cascade, Ursula Stearley

Kemble's Cascade is named after Lucian Kemble, who lived from 1922 to 1999. It is called a cascade because the 20 odd stars composing it seem to cascade in a line, approximately 2.5° in length and spanning from the northwest to the southeast. This phenomenon, however, is only visible as such from our viewpoint within our galaxy.

Kemble's Cascade is what is known as an asterism. This means that it is essentially a constellation within a constellation. Another such asterism would be the Big Dipper within the constellation of The Great Bear. Kemble's Cascade resides within the constellation Camelopardalis. Kemble's Cascade is also known as NGC 1502, which is really at the southeast end of the cascade.

This picture was taken from the Calvin College Observatory in Rehoboth, New Mexico, but this constellation can easily be seen with a pair of binoculars, although with binoculars it is a bit fuzzy(ooh, fuzzy!). It shows the brightest star of the cascade, which is in the center of the line. The region of Kemble's Cascade shown here is approximately 7 minutes across in either direction.

References:

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap000814.html

http://www.jupiter-jp.net/~ike/English/description/Kemble's%20Cascade.htm