This spiral galaxy is located 40 million light years away in the constellation of Virgo at a declination of +3 degrees. It is a magnitude 11.4 galaxy which spans 6 arc-minutes in our apparent view. This corresponds to a diameter of 80,000 light years.
From our view perspective, the disk is inclined about 15 degrees from edge-on.
I usually post my images north up, but this one is south up so that the presumed near side (more detail in the galaxy) is at the bottom. I prefer to see my galaxies that way, so that we are looking “over the top” of the disk.
In
Revision C above, I compare this galaxy to a recent object image post of mine, NGC 4062. Both galaxies have a hybrid flocculent/spiral shape. NGC 4062 has been identified as a
decoupled galaxy, defined as a galaxy which shows two different morphologies when viewed optically and in the near-infrared. The 2 morphologies are often comprised of two different stellar populations - a young Population I and an old Population II, reflected in a bluish spiral disk overlaid over a yellow flocculent disk of older stars. Although this object, NGC 4527, has not been identified as a decoupled galaxy to my knowledge, it looks like it is to me.
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