Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Leo (Leo)
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Arp 255, Gary Imm
Arp 255, Gary Imm

Arp 255

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Arp 255, Gary Imm
Arp 255, Gary Imm

Arp 255

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Description

This Astrobin Debut Object, also known as UGC 5304, is an interacting pair of spiral galaxies located 0.6 billion light years away in the constellation of Leo at a declination of +8 degrees. It was classified by Dr. Arp into the category of Galaxies with Appearance of Fission.

The lower right orange face-on grand design spiral galaxy of this pair is UGC 5304. It is 45 arc-seconds wide in our apparent view, which corresponds to a Milky Way-size diameter of 120,000 light years. The upper left blue edge-on spiral companion is LEDA 200253. It is 25 arc-seconds wide with a diameter of 65,000 light years.

Both galaxies are disturbed by their interaction. The upper galaxy has a warped disk, while the lower galaxy has asymmetric arms. I especially like the "duplicate outer arms" seen left and right of the lower galaxy. Faint star streams extend upwards and downwards from the pair.

The two orange galaxies seen below left and below right are also at the same distance. The interesting blue irregular galaxy at left, UGC 5308, is twice as close, at about 250 million light years. The faint blue galaxy smudge seen at bottom right is even closer, at 120 million light years.

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