Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Ursa Major (UMa)  ·  Contains:  NGC 3718  ·  NGC 3729
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NGC 3718, Bob Stewart
NGC 3718
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NGC 3718

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NGC 3718, Bob Stewart
NGC 3718
Powered byPixInsight

NGC 3718

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Description

An interesting barred spiral galaxy with faint S-shaped arms extending outwards and a prominent dark dust lane running across the middle. This oddly shaped galaxy is around 50 million light-years away from us in the constellation Ursa Major (the Big Dipper). NGC 3718’s odd shape is probably due to gravitational interactions with its neighbor, NGC 3729 (towards the bottom of this image, just left of center). NGC 3729 is also a barred spiral that sits at a distance of around 65 million light-years. Finally, just to the right of NGC 3718 is a small group of galaxies called Hickson Compact Group #56. These four galaxies are strongly interacting with each other and heavily distorting some of their shapes. At a distance of 400 million light-years, these Hickson #56 galaxies are around 8 times further away from us than either NGC 3718 or 3729.

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NGC 3718, Bob Stewart