Israeli astroimager Harel Boren emailed the Astronomy magazine offices that in shooting a wide-field image of the dark nebula Barnard 171 in Cepheus, he may have imaged a previously unknown nebula. The accompanying photo from Boren shows an annotated outline of the shape and area of the newly discovered nebula. Boren captured the image June 2 and 3 from the Negev Desert in Israel, using an 8-inch f/2.8 Boren-Simon Newtonian scope, an SBIG ST8300M CCD camera, and exposures of 1.5 hours through a luminance filter, plus 20 minutes through red, green, and blue filters.

In Boren's words, the object is "a long red (and possibly a little blue) emission nebula that resembles a shock wave as visible in other objects. It is located a little north of Barnard 171 as a slightly curved wave rolling from west to east, and is about 16 arcminutes long and 1 arcminute wide."

For a link to the original, unannotated image, see http://www.pbase.com/boren/image/135469293/original.

In a sky that too often seems distant and unchanging, how refreshing it is to find new discovery in the spectacular imagery of Harel Boren.