This object, also known as IC 701, is a distorted barred spiral galaxy located 280 million light years away in the constellation of Leo at a declination of +20 degrees. In his
Arp catalog, Dr. Arp classified this object into the category of Galaxies with Material Ejected from Nuclei.
This magnitude 15 galaxy spans 40 arc-minutes in our apparent view, which corresponds to a diameter of 60,000 light years. The star stream extension that extends down and left is also about 60,000 light years long. The top right arm of the galaxy seems abbreviated, while the lower left arm is extended by a straight section.
As with most of these Arp objects, little published information is available to help in our understanding of this object and its origin. In my opinion, the Hubble image of the mouseover clearly shows that the bright region at the end of the star stream is a small galaxy, although no galaxy designation exists for it in SIMBAD. It appears that the small galaxy made a close pass to IC 701, causing distortions in the arms of IC 701 and creating a star stream bridge between the 2 galaxies.
Many times, Dr. Arp classified an object in his catalog as having a companion when no such companion exists. This object is perhaps the only object which is the reverse - it has a companion which appears to be responsible for the deformation, but Dr. Arp didn't have the Hubble image to help identify existence of the companion.
The object to the right is the edge-on spiral 2MFGC 9014, which is much closer to us at 190 million light years away. It spans 1 arc-minute in our apparent view, which corresponds to a diameter of 50,000 light years.
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