Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Coma Berenices (Com)  ·  Contains:  IC 4040  ·  IC 4041  ·  IC 4051  ·  NGC 4864  ·  NGC 4865  ·  NGC 4867  ·  NGC 4869  ·  NGC 4871  ·  NGC 4872  ·  NGC 4873  ·  NGC 4874  ·  NGC 4876  ·  NGC 4886  ·  NGC 4889

Image of the day 12/27/2015

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    The Coma Cluster of Galaxies, Abell 1656, LRGB Image, Eric Coles (coles44)
    The Coma Cluster of Galaxies, Abell 1656, LRGB Image
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    The Coma Cluster of Galaxies, Abell 1656, LRGB Image

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    Description

    The Luminance images for the Coma Cluster were gathered at the Sierra Remote Observatories. The RGB data was generously donated by Bob Franke from his Focal Pointe Observatories.

    Thank you very much Bob.

    If you look at the image closely, there are too many galaxies to count. Almost every object that is not round is a galaxy. Here is the description of the Coma Cluster from Wikipedia.

    The Coma Cluster (Abell 1656) is a large cluster of galaxies that contains over 1,000 identified galaxies. Along with the Leo Cluster (Abell 1367), it is one of the two major clusters comprising the Coma Supercluster. It is located in and takes its name from the constellation Coma Berenices.

    The cluster's mean distance from Earth is 99 Mpc (321 million light years). Its ten brightest spiral galaxies have apparent magnitudes of 12–14 that are observable with amateur telescopes larger than 20 cm. The central region is dominated by two supergiant elliptical galaxies: NGC 4874 and NGC 4889. The cluster is within a few degrees of the north galactic pole on the sky. Most of the galaxies that inhabit the central portion of the Coma Cluster are ellipticals. Both dwarf and giant ellipticals are found in abundance in the Coma Cluster.

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    The Coma Cluster of Galaxies, Abell 1656, LRGB Image, Eric Coles (coles44)