Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Hercules (Her)  ·  Contains:  NGC 6363
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NGC 6363, Gary Imm
NGC 6363, Gary Imm

NGC 6363

Getting plate-solving status, please wait...
NGC 6363, Gary Imm
NGC 6363, Gary Imm

NGC 6363

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Description

This Astrobin Debut Object is an elliptical galaxy located 410 million light years away in the constellation of Hercules at a declination of +41 degrees.  This galaxy spans 1 arc-minute in our apparent view, which corresponds to a Milky Way like diameter of 120,000 light years.

I usually don’t have a strong interest in elliptical galaxies, but in database images I noticed an interesting “tail” coming off of the galaxy.  This can be seen faintly in my image as a star stream that extends to the right and down from the galaxy.  The tail is likely a sign of some type of disturbance or perhaps from a past merger. 

Many nearby small galaxies are seen which could be the source of the disturbance.  Several which appear to be blue dwarfs appear within about 1 diameter of the elliptical.  A bit further away, about 2 diameters down and to the left, is a another slightly larger blue galaxy.  No distance information is available for any of these other galaxies.

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