This
Astrobin Debut Object is a galaxy merger located 350 million light years away in the constellation of Pegasus at a declination of +10 degrees. The largest galaxy spans about 1.3 arc-minutes in our apparent view, which corresponds to a Milky Way like diameter of 130,000 light years.
As also seen in the Hubble mouseover, the central 2 galaxies are doing a cosmic tango, showing the typical merger signs of looping star streams, distorted cores and disks, and a reddish color reflecting new star formation. The core of the larger galaxy is very bright and is classified as a Seyfert 2 galaxy. 2 other nearby smaller galaxies appear to also be involved through bridging star streams.
I am surprised that this object was not selected as an Arp object. I have included it in my
collection of M3 merger objects. M3 is the 3rd (of 5) merger categories and corresponds to galaxies which are interacting and in the mid stage of a merger, with their disks touching, their cores in close contact, and significant star streams present.
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