The Leo Tidal Dwarf Galaxy (TDG) is visible at the left end of the 300000 lyr tidal stream that extends from the NGC 3638 galaxy in Leo on the right of the image. This 8.7hr LRGB image of the Leo TDG was taken under very dark, SQM 21.7 conditions.
A Tidal Dwarf Galaxy is a dwarf galaxy that develops from the star and gas "debris" of an interacting galaxy tidal stream. The Leo TDG shown here is the closest known TDG to the Milky Way.
An inverted crop of the tail of the Tidal Stream is compared with that from the Leo TDG discovery paper (Nikiel-Wroczynski, et al., Astrophysical Journal, 2014) at:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/9906726@N08/22099420160/in/album-72157615214859916/My original Leo Triplet image, from which this image is a recent crop, was collected in April 2015, only a few months after the date of the publication. My data was requested by the authors and sent to them, although I don't think it was actually used for anything (as far as I know).
This image is just a larger crop than my recent NGC3628 image:
https://www.astrobin.com/jlxynz/in order to show the full length of the tidal stream and, especially, the Leo Tidal Dwarf Galaxy.
8.7 hr LRGB
D.A.R.C. Observatory, Mercey Hot Springs, CA. 4/12/15, 4/18/15
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