Hickson 44, Will Nourse

Hickson 44

Equipment

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Acquisition details

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Description

Stellarvue SV102ED and Canon 60D at prime focus

Images taken on consecutive nights (5/18/12-5/19/12)

123 x 60 second images stacked and processed with PixInsight, final processing in Photoshop.

Hickson 44 is a compact group of 4 galaxies located about in the constellation of Leo. They lie about 60 million light years away.

Paul Hickson, in an article titled "Compact Groups of Galaxies" published in the Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics in 1997, said:

" Most compact groups contain a high fraction of galaxies having morphological or kinematical peculiarities, nuclear radio and infrared emission, and starburst or active galactic nuclei (AGN) activity. They contain large quantities of diffuse gas and are dynamically dominated by dark matter. They most likely form as subsystems within looser associations and evolve by gravitational processes. Strong galaxy interactions result and merging is expected to lead to the ultimate demise of the group. Compact groups are surprisingly numerous, and may play a significant role in galaxy evolution."

The members of Hickson 44 are:

NGC 3190 (left center), a 12th magnitude Sa type spiral galaxy with a prominent dust lane

NGC 3193 (top left), an 11.8 magnitude elliptical galaxy

NGC 3187 (top center), a 13.6 magnitude SBc spiral galaxy

NGC 3185 (bottom center), a 12.9 magnitude SBb-c spiral galaxy

Comments

Histogram

Hickson 44, Will Nourse