<p>In the northern night sky, you can sometimes find a foreleg-shaped cluster of stars known as the Boötes (Greek word for &quot;herdsman&quot;) constellation. In its vicinity, there is an enormous dark space that is 330 million light-years across and shaped like a sphere.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2024-12-10T12:01:19.347Z
do you have the coordinates (RA+dec) of this area?
Aaron F
CC BY-SA 4.0
2024-12-08T16:43:14.787Z
2024-12-08T16:43:14.787Z
NightRider- Jack
<p>What 1° x 1° region of the night sky has the lowest flux of light?</p>
<p>(considering the typical visual/luminance filter range, approximations using other filters/bands are acceptable, but should be in the optical)</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-10-02T01:57:18.093Z
This is a cool question! I have a hunch there's an answer out there somewhere. One candidate might be the surrounding neighborhood of something like the [Hubble Ultra Deep Field](https://esahubble.org/images/heic0611b/) (itself only 3 x 3 arcminutes) away from the milky way or other diffuse sources and any particularly bright stars which could induce scattered light artifacts in the telescope.
uhoh
CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-10-02T10:12:58.297Z
I agree with @uhoh-- this would be a cool project, but I'm not sure if anyone has made the calculation so far. I'm guessing it would be in the general direction of Fomalhaut (but obviously not including Fomalhaut) since that's the shortest way to leave the galaxy from earth. You could use something like GAIA3 to make the computation, though other sources may work as well.
Barry Carter
CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-10-02T13:12:07.033Z
@BarryCarter I'm currently attempting this with the Gaia (DR1) catalog, however there are a few limitations: the catalog does not include bright stars, and the darkest total flux regions are often caused by nebulas, where the total flux may be different. Filtering this doesn't seem to be easy
2080
CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-10-03T09:39:28.720Z
The HYGData set is a lot smaller and easier to filter, but has far fewer stars. Of course, the (extended) Pareto principle might work here: the n brightest stars may provide 99%+ of the brightness for a given grid square. Occupy the Milky Way... sorry :)
Barry Carter
CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-10-04T11:45:53.710Z
@BarryCarter Whether that holds is a pretty interesting question itself!
2080
CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-10-04T12:39:54.613Z
Are you doing this on github? I'm paralleling your effort (not yet on github) using HYG
Barry Carter
CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-10-05T01:13:36.867Z
@BarryCarter I have put the code here: https://github.com/void4/lowestflux
2080
CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-10-06T02:35:26.950Z
https://github.com/barrycarter/bcapps/blob/master/WORDPRESS/wordpress.barrycarter.info/occupy-the-milky-way.wp was on my now-deleted blog once.
Barry Carter
CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-10-06T12:48:31.480Z
@2080 Wow, you finished it?
Barry Carter
CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-10-07T17:01:01.407Z
@BarryCarter For now I've only checked out regions, not the entire sky. Will return to do that later
2080
CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-10-16T14:56:35.813Z
I rather fancy it will be a square degree in the Taurus molecular cloud - but I'm not really clear what figure of merit you are trying to minimise. Total V-band fliux? I don;t think you can answer this by just summing up bright stars. The log N vs log flux relation is steeper than 1 down to 16th mag or so. But I think looking towards a nearby dark cloud eliminates that problem.
ProfRob
CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-11-20T15:05:32.160Z
https://github.com/barrycarter/lowestflux/tree/main/barry pretty much answers the question using SQL-like queries on the GAIA site itself. I've requested a pull back to the main repo
Barry Carter
CC BY-SA 4.0
2024-11-06T14:39:26.517Z
This question has been asked before of course. The question has a number of answers. Basically they are known as deep field images taken by cameras on Hubble and James Webb space telescopes. a patch of sky is selected which seems to be completely blank - one such is in Ursa Major. point a camera at it and expose it for a few days. In each case what was blank and black is now filled with galaxies and other previously unknown objects. Infra red cameras show more distant objects than those in the visible light of course.
Brian Sheen
CC BY-SA 4.0
2024-12-09T07:51:14.117Z
A sky survey like mellinger would probably be best bet, I cant figure out a way to figure out how to calculate based on it though, and much of the bright stars are clipped. DSS could be good, but its not a very flat survey, image borders stick out significantly.
Topcode
<data-analysis><deep-sky-observing><star-catalogues>
What 1° x 1° region is the optically darkest patch in the sky?
2080
# What 1° x 1° region is the optically darkest patch in the sky?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2022-10-02)

What 1° x 1° region of the night sky has the lowest flux of light?

(considering the typical visual/luminance filter range, approximations using other filters/bands are acceptable, but should be in the optical)

**Tags:** data-analysis, deep-sky-observing, star-catalogues

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: This is a cool question! I have a hunch there's an answer out there somewhere. One candidate might be the surrounding neighborhood of something like the [Hubble Ultra Deep Field](https://esahubble.org/images/heic0611b/) (itself only 3 x 3 arcminutes) away from the milky way or other diffuse sources and any particularly bright stars which could induce scattered light artifacts in the telescope.  
> **username_2**: I agree with @username_1-- this would be a cool project, but I'm not sure if anyone has made the calculation so far. I'm guessing it would be in the general direction of Fomalhaut (but obviously not including Fomalhaut) since that's the shortest way to leave the galaxy from earth. You could use something like GAIA3 to make the computation, though other sources may work as well.  
> **username_0**: @BarryCarter I'm currently attempting this with the Gaia (DR1) catalog, however there are a few limitations: the catalog does not include bright stars, and the darkest total flux regions are often caused by nebulas, where the total flux may be different. Filtering this doesn't seem to be easy  
> **username_2**: The HYGData set is a lot smaller and easier to filter, but has far fewer stars. Of course, the (extended) Pareto principle might work here: the n brightest stars may provide 99%+ of the brightness for a given grid square. Occupy the Milky Way... sorry :)  
> **username_0**: @BarryCarter Whether that holds is a pretty interesting question itself!  
> **username_2**: Are you doing this on github? I'm paralleling your effort (not yet on github) using HYG  
> **username_0**: @BarryCarter I have put the code here: https://github.com/void4/lowestflux  
> **username_2**: https://github.com/barrycarter/bcapps/blob/master/WORDPRESS/wordpress.barrycarter.info/occupy-the-milky-way.wp was on my now-deleted blog once.  
> **username_2**: @username_0 Wow, you finished it?  
> **username_0**: @BarryCarter For now I've only checked out regions, not the entire sky. Will return to do that later  
> **username_3**: I rather fancy it will be a square degree in the Taurus molecular cloud - but I'm not really clear what figure of merit you are trying to minimise. Total V-band fliux? I don;t think you can answer this by just summing up bright stars. The log N vs log flux relation is steeper than 1 down to 16th mag or so. But I think looking towards a nearby dark cloud eliminates that problem.  
> **username_2**: https://github.com/barrycarter/lowestflux/tree/main/barry pretty much answers the question using SQL-like queries on the GAIA site itself. I've requested a pull back to the main repo  
> **username_4**: This question has been asked before of course. The question has a number of answers. Basically they are known as deep field images taken by cameras on Hubble and James Webb space telescopes. a patch of sky is selected which seems to be completely blank - one such is in Ursa Major. point a camera at it and expose it for a few days. In each case what was blank and black is now filled with galaxies and other previously unknown objects. Infra red cameras show more distant objects than those in the visible light of course.  
> **username_5**: A sky survey like mellinger would probably be best bet, I cant figure out a way to figure out how to calculate based on it though, and much of the bright stars are clipped. DSS could be good, but its not a very flat survey, image borders stick out significantly.  

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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_6 on 2024-12-08. Score: 2

In the northern night sky, you can sometimes find a foreleg-shaped cluster of stars known as the Boötes (Greek word for "herdsman") constellation. In its vicinity, there is an enormous dark space that is 330 million light-years across and shaped like a sphere.

> **Comments:**
> **username_7**: do you have the coordinates (RA+dec) of this area?  

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