NGC4096

NGC 4096 is a rather nice spiral galaxy in Ursa Major. It is 14 degrees almost due west of M51. Some claim it is a member of the same group that M51 is in. If so I measure their projected separation as 9 million light-years. NGC 4096 is rather strongly tilted toward being on edge which makes seeing its detail more difficult. Still, it is obviously asymmetrical with the northern half smaller than the southern. This holds for radio as well as visual light. Thus it appears the core is shifted well above its center. While true of the bright disk of the galaxy the disk can be traced faintly much further. In fact, I trace it as extending a bit over 4' of arc to the north of the core and only 3.75' to the south meaning the north may go further from the core, just that it does so very faintly with few stars in the disk. NED classifies it as SAB(rs)c with HII regions. It is in the second Herschel 400 observing program having been discovered by William Herschel on March 9, 1788. Dreyer's description: pretty bright, very large, much elongated at a 32-degree angle.

While NED puts its distance at 36 million light-years other sources say 21 to 42 million light-years. I don't understand the wide range given. Using NED's distance I get a diameter, including the faint extensions, of a bit over 80,000 light-years making it a respectable spiral galaxy. The field contains only very distant background galaxies. I didn't try to identify all that NED had distance data on as they were very faint and barely show in the JPG image. I did include a few of them anyway. A good number of much brighter galaxies in the image had no distance data and were not annotated. Being well north of the ecliptic no asteroids were picked up in the image. It was discovered by William Herschel on March 9, 1788. It is in the second H400 program.

For such an easily imaged galaxy I was surprised how few images of it by amateurs I found.

14" LX200R @ f/10, L=4x10' RGB=2x10', STL-11000XM, Paramount ME

Related Designations for NGC4096

NGC4102

NGC 4102 is a rather strange spiral galaxy in Ursa Major southwest of the bowl of the Big Dipper, not far from the far more well-known M109. It is about 50 million light-years away. I found little consensus on its distance. In fact, I found two different radial velocities giving two different results. Other techniques give even more results. All range in the 47 to 95 million light-year range. Most center around 50 to 60 million light-years. It was discovered by William Herschel on April 12, 1789. My log entry from the original H400 project made on May 4, 1984 using a 12.5" f/5 scope from the New Mexican badlands on a very good night says; "Bright nufleus, tilted spiral with some arm detail seen. About 12th magnitude."

What caused me to put this one on my strange galaxy list is it seems to have three different orientations of its disk. The very core is oriented nearly north-south. The outer ring is rotated about 30 degrees counterclockwise and the inner disk between the core and outer ring turned another 25 degrees counterclockwise. The entire disk appears warped to me but this may be due to the triple axes of symmetry and thus an illusion. Oddly I found no papers discussing these odd features. The inner disk is quite red with a complex set of dust bands sort of spiraling out. Beyond this the outer ring has a blue band of knots with some HII regions I pull out as pink even without using H alpha data. Beyond this the ring turns red again. So seems to have this ring of star formation. There's a bright object I first took for a star near the edge of the galaxy to the southwest. But it is oval. NED shows it to be a galaxy but has no redshift data on it. Could it be the cause of some or all of the galaxies oddities? A bit beyond this compact galaxy is what I take to be a very distant red galaxy just above a red star. Unfortunately it isn't in NED at all. It is clearly a galaxy. The annotated image shows others with a question mark as well that are not in NED even though they lie near far fainter galaxies that are picked up. I didn't search for these, just ran into them wondering if I could find redshift data.

Several galaxy clusters are in the image. I marked one that had no core galaxy to point to. In a couple other cases there was a core galaxy at that point but NED had no redshift data on it. Since in all cases where a core galaxy did have redshift data it was different than the photographically determined redshift of the cluster those with only one value are all the value for the cluster, not the galaxy.

14" LX200R @ f/10, L=4x10' RGB=2x10', STL-11000XM, Paramount ME

Related Designations for NGC4102

NGC4108

NGC 4108 is a triple galaxy system in Draco about 120 million light-years distant. It actually is a group of 4 galaxies, one is not an NGC galaxy so doesn't carry the NGC 4108 catalog entry. There's a faint indication the NGC 4108 triplet have interacted in the past. It was NGC 4108B that attracted my interest to the group. It appears to be a face on spiral galaxy, classed SAB(s)d pec?, that has a disrupted arm structure and a dust lane right across its core. That makes it look like two half spirals that are merging. Even the core is quite blue indicating star formation has been recent and plentiful in recent times. The CGCG says of it: "Blue post-eruptive disrupted spiral with compact knots and bars."

NGC 4108 lies below it and shows distorted arms apparently pulled toward NGC 4108B. Also, a note at NED says "NGC 4108 and NGC 4108B appear joined by an H I bridge [Fig. 13(c)]; however, as the size of the bridge is only on the order of a beam width, most of it could be due to beam smearing." It is classed as (R')SAc. It was discovered on April 3, 1832 by John Herschel.

NGC 4108A lies west of the other two. It is classed as SBbc:. The arm structure seems rather weak and certainly not symmetrical. It is apparently more disturbed when seen at radio frequencies. A note at NED says: "NGC 4108A has a highly warped H I disk [Fig. 13(d)], with the major axes of the outer parts of the H I disk being misaligned (sic) by ~45^deg^ with respect to the optical major axis. The velocity field is peculiar in that at the southern tip the axis of rotation curves in the opposite direction one would expect from the warp in the H I disk."

The fourth member of the group, UGCA 272 is listed as E0/S0. It appears rather featureless and nearly white in color but does have an active core since it is listed as having a narrow line active galactic nucleus (NLAGN). Something has stirred up its core to high activity that is mostly hidden from our direct view.

The image contains quite a few quasars and quasar candidates (UvES), 11 of them. Most only have a photographically determined redshift (noted by a "p" after the distance) which isn't as accurate as a spectroscopic redshift. You'll see "pred" after the distance to one galaxy. That is a predicted redshift whatever that means.

NED shows three galaxy clusters in the image. One that is barely visible a bit northwest of NGC 4108A. More obvious is the pair to the west of NGC 4108. Though I'm not sure it if it is one cluster with two designations or two separate ones at virtually the same distance. There are two bright, large galaxies though only the southern one is listed as being a Bright Cluster Galaxy even though both are listed at the same coordinates as the cluster they anchor. In any case, there are quite a few galaxies at their distance (about 1.5 billion light-years) not only around the two big galaxies but across the image but for the lower left corner region. No size was given for either cluster, only a count of 14 and 13 members.

As usual for this year clouds and haze really did a number on the depth of this image. It is a good 1.5 magnitudes short of my normal limit. It didn't help that I forgot to turn on temperature compensation and a warm front went through as the image was being taken. Even focusing at every filter change (20 minutes) wasn't enough to keep up with the rising temperature which kept defocusing the image, especially at the corners. Corners suffer most when the temperature rises, core loses if it falls and isn't compensated for. Between the two issues, this one needs revisiting. Also, one of the two red frames is very weak. While I'm listing it as using 2 red frames the result is really very close to only one being used.

14" LX200R @ f/10, L=4x10' RGB=2x10', STL-11000XM, Paramount ME

Related Designations for NGC4108

NGC4111

The NGC 4111 galaxy group also known as WBL 380 consists of 20 galaxies according to NED though I find no size for the group. NED places the group at a redshift distance of 42 million light-years which isn't the redshift of any galaxy in the image. NGC 4111 itself NED lists at 47 million light-years with a Tully Fisher distance of about 52 million light-years. NGC 4111 is a nearly featureless spindle galaxy with HII emission and LINER spectrum. It is about 60,000 light-years long at its redshift distance. It was discovered by William Herschel on January 14, 1788. It is in the original Herschel 400 list. My comment from April 18, 1984 using a 12.5" reflector belonging to my astronomy club reads: "Faint galaxies to the south in the same 50x field. Seems to be an edge on but no dust lane seen. Herschel book calls it 'Elliptical with distinct outer arms.' How can this be when ellipticals don't have arms?!?!?!" I didn't mention the NGC galaxies to the northeast. There are only 4 other galaxies in my image with a similar redshift. All the others lie significantly further away. Apparently to get the 20 count for the group distance is ignored? Papers using radio telescopes describe a dust band at right angles to its major axis and visual report a peanut shaped core. That could indicate a recent merger with the dust showing a hint of a polar ring resulting from the merger. I was unable to bring this out, however.

The other galaxies likely physically part of the group in my image are NGC 4117, NGC 4118, UGC 7089 and UGC 7094. NGC 4117 was also discovered by William Herschel but on a different night, February 6, 1788. It's not in either Herschel 400 program. It too is a rather featureless S0 type galaxy. It has a dust lane parallel to the semi-major axis and a SY2 core by some papers. This could indicate it too is digesting a recent NED puts it at 54 million light-years by redshift which makes it only 29,000 light-years in size. Even smaller NGC 4118 lies closer with a redshift distance of 40 million light-years giving it a size of only 7,000 light-years. It was discovered April 20, 1857 by R. J. Mitchell an assistant of William Parsons better known as the Earl of Rosse. One problem with this is according to the same source he worked for the Earl from 1852 to 1855 yet the discovery was 1857. Another source gives the discoverer as Lord Rosse himself though nearly all he claimed to discover were really discovered by his assistants from my research. I'm "Lost in Space" on this one.

UGC 7089 and UGC 7094 are both classified as Sdm: galaxies and are seen rather edge on. UGC 7089 has several nice bright blue star clouds and is the larger of the two. They lie at almost the same redshift of 46 and 47 million light-years respectively. That gives them a size of 53,000 and 30,000 light-years respectively.

The remaining NGC galaxy, NGC 4109 lies much further away at 330 million light-years. So while small in angular size is really 63,000 light-years in diameter making it actually slightly larger than NGC 4111. NGC 4109 was discovered by Bindon Stoney, another of the Earl's assistants on April 21, 1841. It has a companion MCG +07-25-025. It appears to me to be a rather disorganized barred spiral though NED doesn't attempt to classify it. There's a third galaxy at about the same distance in the upper right corner of my image that is much smaller in size. They must be related.

There are a number of galaxies at about 73 million light-years in the image. NED does show a group at that distance, SDSSCGB 33732, but with only 4 members. I see 11 in my image.

There are a couple galaxy clusters in the image I could identify and some I couldn't. The two only have photographic distance estimates for both the cluster and the bright cluster galaxy I use to mark the location. The one UvES object is a quasar candidate with only a photographic redshift.

14" LX200R @ f/10, L=4x10' RGB=2x10', STL-11000XM, Paramount ME

Related Designations for NGC4111

NGC4145

NGC 4145 is a barred spiral in western Canes Venatici about 68 million light-years distant. Redshift puts it a bit closer, other measurements at NED average 67 with the Spitzer Space Telescope website saying 68. It is considered part of the Ursa Major Galaxy group. While it is listed as having HII emission and a hint of it is seen in my image most say it has little dust and gas left so it's star-forming days are mostly over. It still has some blue in its arms, however. The Spitzer image is rather dim where star formation would normally be seen in IR indicating there really isn't much star formation going on. NGC 4145 was discovered by William Herschel on March 18, 1787. It is in the second H400 Observing Program.

There is a star like object toward the northwest end of the bar yet the galaxy shows no core. Is this object its core pulled off center? One note at NED indicates that either this is the core or a star, they can't tell which. I'd expect a core to be rather bright in the Spitzer image yet it has only about the same brightness difference as seen in visual light. If a star it is somewhat red so would show in an IR image at about the brightness seen in the Spitzer image. My seeing is so poor my stars are pretty fuzzy. In better seeing the PSF of the stars would be enough different from a core that it would likely answer the question but the seeing was so poor in my image some stars have a PSF similar to distant galaxies. I'd expect a small bright core could have a PSF similar to a star in my image thanks to the seeing. Still, for now, I am going to say it more likely a star though Adam Block says it is the core and off-center because this galaxy is interacting with NGC 4151 (yet to be imaged thanks to my lousy spring) to the south. (Edit: It has been taken since this was written.) To me, a force that pulls the core off center would create noticeable (likely great) distortion in the galaxy. I see none. Though NGC 4151 does have huge faint outer arms that could indicate it has interacted with some other galaxy. Or it may be this way due to digesting a recently eaten galaxy. Adam's direct image lick has died but you can see it here http://annesastronomynews.com/photo-gallery-ii/galaxies-clusters/ngc-4145-by-adam-block/

The other major galaxy in the image is NGC 4145A. Its redshift distance is about the same as the Spitzer distance for NGC 4145. If correct they are true companions. Even the single Tully Fisher measurement is not greatly different. A note at NED mentions a small galaxy "attached" to it. Even in my poor seeing it doesn't appear attached though there is a faint star between it and NGC 4145A. Redshift shows they are separated by over a billion light-years. So much for it being "attached".

The annotated image has one galaxy west of NGC 4145 marked by a question mark. As usual, it means the object isn't listed by NED. Low surface brightness galaxies sometimes suffer this fate. Why I don't know. I don't hunt for these but stumble across them. I'm sure they are more common than my annotated images indicate.

14" LX200R @ f/10 L=4x10' RGB=2x10', STL-11000XM, Paramount ME

Related Designations for NGC4145

NGC4147

NGC 4147 is a globular cluster Coma Berenices about 63,000 light-years from us and 70,000 light-years from the center of the galaxy so it is in the far outer reaches of our galaxy's halo well above the galaxies plane. It was discovered by William Herschel on March 14, 1784. A few weeks earlier, on February 15, 1784 he found an object now listed as NGC 4153. There is nothing at that position. Some think it was really what we now know as NGC 4147. SIMBAD considers it non-existent. Others including NED and my database in The Sky say the two are the same object.

The globular is considered by many to not be our globular at all but that of the Sagittarius Dwarf Elliptical Galaxy (SagDEG) that is being torn apart and digested by our galaxy. Other globulars are also considered likely members of this mostly dismembered galaxy including M54, Palomar 2, Palomar 12 and Whiting 1. M54 and Palomar 12 are too far south for my latitude. Whiting 1 has been on the to-do list for some time now but it is such a poor object I've assigned it a low priority. Because of this it just doesn't get taken.

It made my list because globulars in this part of the sky are rare though M 53 and NGC 5053 are two well-known globulars in Coma Berenices that are much closer to us. It also made the list because it is in the original Herschel 400 list. My entry from April 20, 1985 with my 10" f/5 reads: " Small, compact globular. Grainy but not resolved. Slightly brighter toward the center."

I had this one on my to-do list twice. Once under NGC 4147 and once under a two object combination of it and the flat galaxy FGC 1379. Somehow I gave the single object a higher priority and ended up centering on the globular rather than between these two. Thus the very interesting FGC 1379 was out of the field. A blunder on my part. Jim Shudder didn't make my mistake so you can see what I missed at: http://www.pbase.com/jshuder/image/123936737/original . It was Jim's image that showed me I could put both in one field then I didn't do it.

I've prepared an annotated image which includes three asteroids. One moving very rapidly and two others moving quite slowly. Interestingly all were moving downward one quite rapidly. So much so it was quite faint as its light hit a pixel for less than a minute while the others were on the same pixel for 3 or 4 minutes making them appear much brighter for their magnitude. Also in the annotated image is a quasar marked with a question mark. This is because NED lists it as a star or point source object and lastly as a quasar. Photographic redshifts can be fooled into showing a very wrong value. Apparently, NED feels that might have happened here when they don't even consider it a candidate quasar. One of those is also in the image. Its redshift is spectroscopically determined and it is quite blue so I have a rather high degree of confidence it is a true quasar. There are several galaxy clusters. Two with a bright cluster galaxy that I've used to mark its location and a third without such a galaxy. I just point to the pixel that marks its position at NED though with a diameter of 10 minutes of arc it is hard to say what is a member of the cluster and what isn't as nothing with the right redshift value is in the area. It is ZwCl 1206.9+1842 for those wishing to look it up and try to identify what faint fuzzies in my image belong to it.

14" LX200R @ f/10, L=4x10' RGB=2x10', STL-11000XM, Paramount ME

Related Designations for NGC4147

NGC4151

NGC 4151 is one of two galaxies studied in the paper that introduced the concept of Seyfert Galaxies so is one of the most researched galaxies in the sky. So this text is rather long. Yet when I searched for it I found very few amateur images of this rather spectacular galaxy. Why amateurs ignore one of the most important galaxies in the sky I have no idea. How studied is it? Well, it has 67 different catalog listings in NED and 78 in SIMBAD. NED lists 52 detailed notes from papers on it, most major galaxies have a dozen or so. SIMBAD lists 2901 references for it. I didn't begin to explore them all. But for all these papers we seem to have a really poor understanding of how far it is from us. I found at least a dozen different distance estimates ranging from about 13 million to nearly 100 million light-years for this galaxy. NED puts its redshift at 57 million light-years while a mean of 7 non-redshift measurements says 22 million light-years. NASA has a nice write up on it that says 43 million light-years. That write up calls it the Eye of Sauron Galaxy and is at: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/chandra/multimedia/11-029.html#.VUHAhpOrF9s . Then I found this article that claims to have pinned down its distance with an error bar of 10% as 62 million light-years http://www.sci-news.com/astronomy/science-distance-eye-sauron-ngc4151-02303.html . With at least 12 different measurements to choose from, roll a dodecahedron die and see what comes up then verify with a Magic 8 ball. I'm going to go with the 62 million light-year figure as it is the only one to even give an error bar with its estimate.

Using the 62 million light-year figure just how big is this galaxy with his expansive outer arm structure. Again I have some major discrepancies. I measure the arms on my image as being about 8.3 minutes across while NED says 6.3. Other sources give other sizes. None as large as my measurement however. Still, I'm quite confident in it as representative of the extent I picked up. That gives a diameter of about 150,000 light-years. Large for a spiral but not out of line with other large spirals. Using NED's diameter it is only about 114,000 light-years. about the size of our galaxy.

It was discovered by William Herschel on March 17, 1787 and is in the original Herschel 400 list. My comment from March 23, 1985 with a 10" f/5 at 150 power under excellent conditions reads "Stellar nucleus with a large outlying area. Bright and easy. Seems far larger than the 2.5' x 1.6' size Burnham's shows. Forms a nice pair with NGC 4145 a half degree to the north." So the size issue goes back a long way. I don't know why I didn't mention NGC 4156 a much closer companion in my image. Was it too faint for me? NGC 4145 was also found by William Herschel but isn't in either Herschel 400 listing. I have imaged it back in 2013. It appears slightly disturbed and has a similar redshift to NGC 4151 and a non-redshift distance of 67 million light-years, within the 10% range of the 62 million light-year estimate for 4151. They may be related and possibly have interacted in the distant past but I can't find anything on this.

NGC 4151 is a very photogenic galaxy that amateurs have virtually ignored. I can't understand why. The delicate blue streamers mixed into the main disk are quite unique. I've never seen another galaxy quite like it with these fine streams of blue stars that seem to have no connection with a normal spiral pattern, especially at the southeastern end.

The other NGC galaxy in the image is NGC 4156. It is a rather normal looking barred spiral though its two main arms are full of star knots. Like NGC 4151 it has a distance issue. Though a much bigger one. Redshift puts it at 320 million light-years, 5 times more distant than nearby 4151. But NED has ONE non-redshift measurement that comes in at 51 million light-years, a 6 times difference. If the 320 million light-year distance is correct then it is some 120,000 light-years across, a large barred spiral. If the 51 million light-year distance is used then it is only 19,000 light-years across. So is it a dwarf or large spiral? I'm going to go with the 320 million light-year distance as the resolution seems way too low for the closer distance and on par with others I've imaged at that distance. That Asian astronomer Sum Ting Wong has struck again I believe. It too was discovered by William Herschel on March 17, 1787 the same night as he found 4151. He found 4145 the following night or was it the same night after midnight when the others were before midnight? This image is full of unanswered questions it seems.

UGC 7188 is a really messed up galaxy to the east that probably is a companion to NGC 4156. Though one paper calls it a companion of NGC 4151 with a distance of 57 million light-years. I don't know how that was determined. Maybe it just assumes it's redshift is the same. I don't know. But for such a highly studied area all these discrepancies seems unusual.

On the north edge of UGC 7188 at a position midway between two blue somethings NED says another galaxy with HII emission is to be found. It gives a similar redshift to that of UGC 7188. I think it likely is just a pair of star knots in the galaxy buried in HII and not really a separate galaxy.

There are many other interesting things in the image some cause me to wonder what the... Above UGC 7188 are two galaxies listed at NED from the MDS (HST Medium Deep Survey) In my image as well as the Sloan image they show as stars. No detail at all yet NED lists one as a peculiar spiral and the other as an E0 with debris. How was that possible from images that look just like stars? Also, I thought I was being rather silly using the term debris for the stars spilled out by galaxy collision and here NED is using the term! But no hint of spiral structure or debris was seen. So I went to the HST image. There the lower is certainly a spiral the core seems off center which may have earned it the pec label. The northern galaxy is much smaller, just barely larger than a star in fact but extremely saturated. When I stretched the image something is seen to the south. I can't tell if it is another galaxy or a stream of debris but it looks more like another galaxy to my eye. Down and to the right is a larger galaxy with obvious debris that was too faint to show on my image. So at least I know NED was using the HST image to classify these to otherwise points of light.

To the southwest of NGC 4151 is a quasar at 11.53 billion light-years that NED lists as having DLyA characteristics. These are rather rare I think as it is the first I've come across in all the years I've been annotating images. It stands for Damped Lyman Alpha. You can read about what the heck that is at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damped_Lyman-alpha_system

Another quasar in the image, this one north of NGC 4151 at only 5.85 billion light-years, is listed as being a BLLAC. This stands for a BL Lacertae-type object. They are often considered not to be quasars but a step or so below quasars in activity level. They lack the broad emission lines that characterize quasars. Though NED often calls them quasars. You can read more about this at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BL_Lac_object

Several galaxies are sitting behind clouds of transparent gas. We know they are there as they add dark lines to the spectrum but with a lesser redshift indicating they aren't associated with the quasar as opposed to DLyA clouds. I've listed both the distance to the galaxy and to the AbLS (the gas cloud with the initials for Absorption Line System). These all are just west (right) of NGC 4151.

To the northeast of NGC 4151 is a tight trio of galaxies. So tight they overlap in my image. The two southern ones have redshift values that put them 2.37 billion light-years distant. They have only one designation each at NED and it is long starting with NGC 4151. I listed both on the same annotation with one distance. The northern member had no redshift data.

Now for another mystery. NGC 4151 is listed at NED as being the center of the NGC 4151/WBl 383 galaxy group of 16 galaxies with a redshift distance of 190 million light-years. Now how can a group be at a distance over 3 times that of the galaxy it is named for? Not only that one single galaxy in the image has a redshift or any other determined distance of even close to 190 million light-years. I've not a clue to this one!

Nothing like imaging one of the most studied galaxies of all time (besides our own local group) and finding all these issues. I expected this one to be super easy and it has taken me many days to figure all this out and I'm far from finding answers, just more questions.

The first night I tried for this one I got three good luminance frames then was clouded out. I succeeded the second night so have 7 luminance frames rather than my normal 4. Probably helped a bit to bring out the arms but conditions that first night were poor for transparency so I doubt those three were of much help. I know they degraded resolution a bit but hope it was worth it to get slightly more of the faint arms.

14" LX200R @ f/10, L=7x10' RGB=2x10', STL-11000XM, Paramount ME

Related Designations for NGC4151

NGC4157

NGC 4157 is a very large, near edge-on spiral galaxy in eastern Ursa Major on the border with Canes Venatici. In fact, the very faint eastern extension of the galaxy lies in Canes Venatici. NED and most others classify it as SAB(s)b?. It was discovered by William Herschel on March 9, 1788 and is in the second H400 program showing not all the "good ones" are in the first 400. They saved some for the second. While my notes from the second are lost my notes from the first, indicate I was wondering why some losers were in the first list when some like this one weren't. I measure it at about 150,000 light-years across making it a huge spiral. It likely would be spectacular seen face on though I suspect it may not have as bright a surface brightness as say M51 or others in this part of the sky. While redshift puts it at 45 million light-years distant other measurements average out to 54 to 55 million light-years. Most sources I saw say it is likely at least this distant. Some say it is a bit further away which makes it even larger than my 150,000 light-year estimate. For such a nice galaxy I was surprised how few amateur images I found of it. I assume the two faint extensions, most easily seen to the upper left, are due to faint, widely extended arms rather than plumes. If so it might be more a SAB(s)c or even SAB(s)d galaxy if seen face-on.

Also interesting are two possible companions to its south. DDO 111 is a blue galaxy, a bit further out than was expected when the catalog was made if the redshift is right. It certainly is a blue but a star poor irregular galaxy about 25,000 light-years across. It is classified as an irregular Magellanic galaxy much like the two Magellanic clouds near our galaxy. Is it seen edge-on or is it really long and thin? It appears slightly warped as well. For some reason, it carries two PGC numbers 38767 and 38781. Nearby at the same redshift is a dwarf S0 galaxy only about 11,000 light-years in size. Their projected separation is only 65,000 light-years. Likely they are considerably further apart or more distortion would be seen in both.

Also in their area is the distant galaxy cluster of GMBCG J182.80962+50.30621. Most of its galaxies have a redshift distance of 3.85 to 3.87 billion light-years. Just under NGC 4157 is another galaxy cluster, GMBCG J182.79448+50.42954 at 4.58 billion light-years. At least that's the distance to its bright cluster galaxy. No other galaxies in the group were listed with redshift distance, likely due to its great distance making most too faint.

14" LX200R @ f/10, L=4x10' RGB=2x10', STL-11000XM, Paramount ME

Related Designations for NGC4157

NGC4163

NGC 4163/NGC4167 is a dwarf starburst galaxy that is part of the Ursa Major group just west of the far better known and larger dwarf NGC 4214. It is located in western Canes Venatici and about 935 million light-years away. The HST has studied this and a couple other dwarf starburst galaxies. You can read about it at http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/archive/releases/2009/19/full/ Click the "Release Images" tab to see the individual galaxy images. Hubble had no trouble resolving it into stars. My seeing wasn't very good the night I took this, over 3" so I resolved nothing I'm afraid. Maybe on a better night. While redshift puts it at 20 million light-years this method isn't reliable for such short distances. Study of the individual stars, especially the tip of the red giant branch gives the more reliable estimate of 9.3 to 9.5 million light-years. I show both (HST determination in parentheses) in the annotated image.

NGC 4163 was discovered by William Herschel on April 28, 1785. It isn't in either of the H400 programs. Later on March 11, 1831 his son John recorded it and somehow neither he nor Dreyer realized it was the same object. That's how it got the NGC 4167 identification in the NGC.

West of NGC 4163 is the galaxy cluster WHL J121144.6+360943 with 23 members in the proverbial unknown area. The photographic redshift for the cluster puts it at 3.5 billion light years but the spectroscopic measurement of the BCG at its heart says 3.6 billion light-years which is likely more accurate. Quite a few faint fuzzies are seen in the area that are likely members but none anywhere near as big and bright as the BCG of the same name as the cluster.

The galaxy cluster at the bottom of the image just right of center is GMBCG J182.98714+36.02587 at a photographic redshift of 4.3 billion light years. The same photographic redshift is reported for the BGC.

The NSCS J121108+360614 galaxy cluster to the southwest has no core galaxy. It is listed as having 44 members but no radius is given. Many faint fuzzies are in the area, however. I assume many to be cluster members. The annotated image denotes the center of the cluster as defined in NED. The error circle is 15 arc seconds so the center is rather ill-defined compared to my line. Then all this got blown out of the water when I noticed WHL J121105.2+360656, another galaxy cluster less than a minute of arc away. It is said to have 11 members in that same unknown radius at a photographic redshift of 3.4 billion light-years. So which are which of which cluster is now something unknown to me. This group does have a galaxy at the cluster's core position (well in the center of its 15 arc second error radius. But it isn't listed as a cD (cluster dominant or center dominant are corrupt definitions but work here) or BGC (Brightest Galaxy in the Cluster) nor does it have a redshift that I found.

A more correct explanation of cD is that it is part of a galaxy classification system from Yerkes Observatory in which c stands for a very large galaxy while D is used for one that is very diffuse. Since many central galaxies of a cluster are huge and diffuse SO or elliptical galaxies due to having merged with many cluster members they get this classification. But they are also the dominant galaxy in the cluster and usually in the center hence the other uses of the term.

Just when you think things can't get more confusing up pops GMBCG J182.77098+36.11180 BCG at 4.2 billion light-years determined photographically. It is a BCG obviously but where was its cluster? Then I noticed that NSCS J121108+360614 is listed at NED as also being GMBCG J182.77098+36.11180! Note that the name contains the coordinates of the position of the object. The position J182.77098+36.11180 matches that of the BGC, not the cluster's position. Is this an error? The photographically determined distances don't match. About this time I headed for the booze cabinet.

Near the edge of the upper right quadrant are some galaxies at 1.7 billion light-years. Just off the edge of my image is the location of the galaxy cluster MaxBCG J182.68333+36.25398 and its BCG. They are shown at 1.7 billion light years. The cluster has no given radius and 14 members. Some appear to be labeled in my annotated image.

14" LX200R @ f/10, L=8x10' RGB=2x10', STL-11000XM, Paramount ME

Related Designations for NGC4163

NGC4178

NGC 4178 is a rather odd barred spiral in northern Virgo some 33 to 55 million light-years distant. Redshift puts it at 33 million light-years but the mean of Tully Fisher measurements puts it at 55 million light-years. Most agree it is a true member of the Virgo Cluster thus making the Tully Fisher distance most likely the more accurate. Members of the cluster often show high velocities, some so high they are blue shifted. Also, the detail seen not only in my image but those of major scopes is consistent with the greater distance. NED shows it classified as SB(rs)dm HII. With the low redshift H alpha emission would be within the passband of my filter. I intended to take at least one image to see if I'd pick it up in the blue star clouds but the weather never cooperated so that didn't happen. It was discovered by John Herschel on April 11, 1825.

The galaxy has a long central bar and no real central bulge. Only a hint of a spiral arm comes off the southern end of the bar while a weak on comes from the northern bar. Much of its disk is rather featureless with very little spiral structure. The only structure being provided by what appear to be randomly placed star clouds. The galaxy was discovered by John Herschel on April 11, 1825. It is also shown as discovered three-quarters of a century later on September 6, 1900 by the German astronomer, Arnold Schwassmann, and listed as IC 3042. Being quite flat with little central bulge it made the 2 Micron Flat Galaxy Catalog as 2MFGC 09611.

To the southeast is a "small" face on spiral about a billion light-years distant. Thus it is really quite large, about 145,000 light-years across in fact. It's only its great distance that makes it appear small.

I've marked a star-like object as Q? in the annotated image that is south and a bit west of NGC 4178. NED's position has a 10-second error bar for a 21st magnitude quasar. This object is the only thing I see about 21st magnitude (20.7 by my reading) in the area. Certainly, nothing else is in the area that is about that brightness. But it is about 18 seconds from the position shown for the quasar so not in the 10-second error bar. Checking the Sloan image shows nothing within the error bar's range down to 24th magnitude so I've marked the only possible candidate. Still, the entire object may be erroneous so I've labeled it with a question mark for its identification being questionable.

A quasar candidate (QC) is noted only about 1.5 billion light-years distant west of NGC 4178. It's PSF is that of a small disk galaxy, not a quasar. The Sloan image shows a bright core in the center of a faint rather featureless disk galaxy same as my PSF indicates. One catalog at NED does say it is a galaxy, two a quasar and one an Ultraviolet Source. It certainly is some type of AGN but the quasar seems dim for one at that close distance.

Four asteroids snuck into the image. Details are on the annotated image. One was moving very slowly making a very short trail in 40 minutes indicating it was caught just as it was changing from prograde motion to retrograde motion.

14" LX200R @ f/10, L=4x10' RGB=2x10', STL-11000XM, Paramount ME

Related Designations for NGC4178