A Beautiful galaxy of Hubble type "S?" as identified by NASA's Extragalactic Database (NED). It lies in Camelopardalis, along its border with Cepheus & Cassiopeia.
The structure of this one is certainly bizarre. Even professionals are left scratching their heads and adding a question mark to the scientific morphological designation. To me, I see what appears to be the beginnings of a grand design spiral structure, with two arms wrapped fairly tight forming the circle of a galactic disk. The base spiral that I envision is similar to the structure of
NGC 6951. Extending to the south a faint region can be seen, which appears to be the result of tidal disturbance, which could indicate interaction or merger. I also see evidence in the way that the northern arm so fully loops back to the core. Despite this, I see no evidence at the core to indicate a merger, nor does there appear to be a conveniently nearby companion that could have gravitationally disturbed this galaxy.
Speaking of the core, the core of this galaxy is quite fascinating. The core itself is decently bright, partially blocking the view of an apparent ring structure. There appears to be a small ring wrapped continuously around the core.
Emanating from the core and running eat-west are two thin lanes of absorption nebulosity. These are quite perplexing, as they appear to follow the top little spiral arm "loop," but there do not seem to be similar structures in the bottom loop.
This is the first image of this object to appear on AstroBin, which is surprising due to its relatively bright apparent magnitude of around 11.
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