NGC 1302 — S0-a in Fornax
S0-a in Fornax, 4.3 arcminutes across, its light 82 million years old. Measured by HyperLEDA, photographed by Pan-STARRS1. Recorded once.
About NGC 1302
What you are looking at
NGC 1302 is a lenticular galaxy: a disc galaxy that has largely used up the gas it needs to form new stars, so its disc is smooth and has no spiral arms. It faces us almost squarely, which shows its full structure at once. From edge to edge its visible disc spans about 101,000 light-years, close to the width of the Milky Way.
What astronomers have recorded
SIMBAD, the reference database astronomers use, classes it as a member of a group of galaxies. One supernova has been recorded in it: SN 2003if. It is cited in 153 scientific papers indexed by SIMBAD, and recorded there under 21 different catalogue designations.
When this light set out
What a telescope records of NGC 1302 is light that left it about 82 million years ago; on Earth, dinosaurs were at their peak. The galaxy is moving away from us at about 1,706 km/s (3.8 million mph), carried by the expansion of the universe.
Finding it in the sky
In the sky, NGC 1302 sits within the constellation Fornax. It is best placed on winter evenings: around 9:30 pm in December it stands about 24° high in the south, seen from the middle of the United States.
Its neighbours
At almost the same distance from us, and so its neighbours in space as well as on the sky: NGC 1306 (0.6° away on the sky, at least 870,000 light-years from it); NGC 1255 (1.5° away on the sky, at least 2,080,000 light-years from it); NGC 1292 (1.6° away on the sky, at least 2,270,000 light-years from it).
By apparent size it is number 195 of the 12,657 galaxies on the Galaxy Origins register.
Measurements
| Catalogue | PGC 12431 |
|---|---|
| Morphological type | S0-a |
| Angular diameter | 4.26′ |
| Right ascension | 03h19m51.1s |
| Declination | -26°03′38.0″ |
| Constellation | Fornax |
| Inclination | 25.7° |
| Light travel time | 82 million years |
| Bar | yes, from the catalogue |
Check every figure above in the NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database
What is sold
A print of this galaxy and the record of the calculation, once. When it sells it leaves the register and is not offered again. We assign no names and no ownership — nobody can sell you those.
At 4.3 arcminutes this is a Exceptional galaxy, which is the tier where a real photograph shows clear structure and dust lanes. The tier comes from the measured diameter, not from a price list.
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