This
Astrobin Debut Object, also known as the NGC 4933 group, is a trio of galaxies located 150 million light years away in the constellation of Virgo at a declination of -11 degrees. In his
Arp catalog, Dr. Arp classified this object into the category of Galaxies with Narrow Counter-tails. The mouseover compares my image with black and white Arp and Hubble images.
The large spiral galaxy at center is NGC 4933. It is 80,000 light years in diameter. I love the dust lanes here - a strong centerline dust band along with several other dust regions. It appears as if a very long dust band has spiraled around the galaxy core several times.
The elliptical galaxy at lower right is IC 4173. A tail is seen extending down to the lower right from this galaxy. This tail would seem to be a tidal distortion from interaction of this companion of NGC 4933. But I am puzzled by the apparent drop-off in brightness immediately to the lower right of the elliptical. I think there is a possibility that the tail is actually coming from the spiral behind it.
The small blue galaxy to the upper left is PGC 45143. The data shows it to be at the same distance as the other two. This galaxy appears somewhat disturbed but doesn't seem to be connected by star stream to the spiral, so perhaps there is not much interaction occurring with this one.
On the left side of the image, the beautiful barred ring galaxy is IC 4134.
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