Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Coma Berenices (Com)  ·  Contains:  Black Eye Galaxy  ·  Black-eye galaxy  ·  Evil Eye Galaxy  ·  M 64  ·  NGC 4826
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M64, Gary Imm
M64, Gary Imm

M64

Getting plate-solving status, please wait...
M64, Gary Imm
M64, Gary Imm

M64

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Description

This Seyfert spiral galaxy is located only 14 million light years away in the constellation of Coma Berenices at a declination of +22 degrees.  It is a magnitude 8.5 galaxy which spans 11 arc-minutes in our apparent view.  This corresponds to a diameter of 50,000 light years.  It appears to us about 30 degrees from edge-on and is the 27th brightest galaxy in the sky.

This galaxy, nicknamed the Black Eye Galaxy, has an impressive meandering wide dust lane which appears strongly on the bottom right (assumed near side) of the core.  The dust lane looks like it is also present but obscured by stars on the upper left side. The outer disk is diffuse, although numerous concentric rings can subtly be seen within the disk.

The outer disk of M64 is unusual in that it contains two counterrotating nested disks of ionized, molecular and neutral gas.

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