This dwarf irregular galaxy is located only 3 million light years away in the constellation of Cetus at a declination of -15 degrees. At magnitude 11, it spans 13 arc-minutes in our apparent view, which corresponds to a small diameter of 11,000 light years.
The origin of the WLM name is interesting. It stands for Wolf–Lundmark–Melotte. This object was discovered in 1909 by Max Wolf, but at that time it was not identified as a galaxy. That identification was done by Knut Lundmark and Philibert Jacques Melotte in 1926.
WLM is just slightly further away than the Andromeda galaxy (M31). It is close enough to clearly see blue star clouds. Our view of WLM is muddled a bit by closer superimposed white, orange and blue Milky Way stars, which at first seem to appear as part of WLM. This galaxy is described as barred by some sources but I have a hard time seeing that.
As identified in the mouseover, the one globular cluster of this galaxy (WLM-1) is seen as the white circular smudge slightly to the right (3’o’clock position).
The small edge-on spiral galaxy to the above left is over 100 times further away, at about 0.5 billion light years.
For more dwarf local galaxies similar to WLM, please see my
Dwarf Local Galaxy Collection.
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