Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Draco (Dra)  ·  Contains:  NGC 5905  ·  NGC 5908
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NGC 5905 and NGC 5908, Gary Imm
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NGC 5905 and NGC 5908

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NGC 5905 and NGC 5908, Gary Imm
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NGC 5905 and NGC 5908

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Description

These two beautiful spiral galaxies are located 150 million light years away in the constellation of Draco at a declination of +55 degrees. NGC 5905 is face-on and NGC 5908 is edge-on.

NGC 5905 is a barred ring galaxy with a large diameter of almost 200,000 light years, resulting in an apparent width to us of 4 arc-minutes. Each end of the bar connects to a spiral arm which reaches the outer disk after 270 degrees of rotation. Blue star clusters are visible in each arm.

NGC 5908 reminds me of the Sombrero Galaxy, although it is 5x further away than the Sombrero. This edge-on galaxy is about 120,000 light years in diameter and has a bright stellar bulge.

The recessional velocities of these two galaxies are similar and it looks to me that they are disturbed, possibly by each other.  The arm of NGC 5905 is disturbed on the side towards NGC 5908.  Similarly, NGC 5908 has a slightly asymmetric disk and dust lane, as well as a slightly offset core.

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