This
Astrobin Debut Object, also known as NGC 341, is a small face-on spiral galaxy located 200 million light years away in the constellation of Cetus at a declination of -9 degrees. This magnitude 15 galaxy spans 1 arc-minute in our apparent view, which corresponds to a diameter of 60,000 light years.
In his
Arp catalog, Dr. Arp classified this object into the category of Spiral Galaxies with Small, High Surface Brightness Companions on Arms.
I love the arm structure of this galaxy. Short yellow stubby arms extend out from the core before taking a 90 degree turn and flowing into beautiful blue arms sweeping around for 360 degrees. The arms have hints of VV rows.
The big question here is whether the small blue galaxy to the left (LEDA 3627) is a companion. No distance data is available for it. On the one hand, the main galaxy is only slightly distorted, casting doubt on the idea of a true companion galaxy. But on the other hand, the small galaxy color and structure looks more like a blue dwarf galaxy instead of a large distant one.
My guess is that the small galaxy is a dwarf companion of NGC 341, one that is not quite close enough yet to cause much interaction. This blue region also could simply be a star cloud, similar to the blue region immediately to its right, but this one seems too far from the core of NGC 341 for that.
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