NGC 2985 — Sab in Ursa Major
Sab in Ursa Major, 3.6 arcminutes across, its light 64 million years old. Measured by HyperLEDA, photographed by Pan-STARRS1. Recorded once.
About NGC 2985
What you are looking at
NGC 2985 is an early-type spiral: a large, bright central bulge wrapped in smooth, tightly wound arms. It is tilted about 38° to our line of sight, enough to show both the shape of its arms and the depth of its disc. From edge to edge its visible disc spans about 67,000 light-years (taking its redshift distance, which for a galaxy this near is approximate), about 68% of the Milky Way’s width.
What astronomers have recorded
SIMBAD, the reference database astronomers use, classes it as a Seyfert galaxy: its nucleus is lit by gas falling into its central black hole, though dust hides part of that glow from us. It is cited in 273 scientific papers indexed by SIMBAD, and recorded there under 22 different catalogue designations.
When this light set out
What a telescope records of NGC 2985 is light that left it about 64 million years ago; on Earth, an asteroid had ended the age of dinosaurs. The galaxy is moving away from us at about 1,323 km/s (3.0 million mph), carried by the expansion of the universe. For a galaxy this close, its own motion through space is a large share of that speed, so the distance worked out from it is approximate; distances measured from individual stars in it can differ.
Finding it in the sky
NGC 2985 lies in Ursa Major. From most of the United States it never sets: it circles the north celestial pole all year, and stands highest on spring evenings, around March.
Its neighbours
At almost the same distance from us, and so its neighbours in space as well as on the sky: NGC 3027 (0.4° away on the sky, at least 460,000 light-years from it); UGC 5455 (2.2° away on the sky, at least 2,440,000 light-years from it).
By apparent size it is number 315 of the 12,657 galaxies on the Galaxy Origins register.
Measurements
| Catalogue | PGC 28316 |
|---|---|
| Morphological type | Sab |
| Angular diameter | 3.61′ |
| Right ascension | 09h50m22.1s |
| Declination | +72°16′45.1″ |
| Constellation | Ursa Major |
| Inclination | 37.9° |
| Light travel time | 64 million years |
| Bar | not recorded |
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 3.6 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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