NGC 772
NGC 772, the Nautilus Galaxy, is an unusual unbarred spiral galaxy in the constellation of Aries, located 1.5 degrees east-southeast of Mesarthim, Gamma Arietis. It has an apparent size of 7.2 x 4.3 arcminutes and shines at an apparent magnitude of 10.3. It is located 100 million light-years away. At this distance, its true size in space would be more than 200,000 light-years in diameter, twice that of our Milky Way Galaxy. NGC 772 is also cataloged as Arp 78, a peculiar spiral galaxy that may be interacting with its companion dwarf elliptical galaxy NGC 770 which may have caused its spiral arms to be distorted. NGC 770 can be seen to the lower right of NGC 772. The galaxy was discovered by William Herschel in 1785. North is to the top in the above image.
|
||||||||
|