NGC 3344 — Sbc in Leo Minor
Sbc in Leo Minor, 6.7 arcminutes across, its light 28 million years old. Measured by HyperLEDA, photographed by Pan-STARRS1. Recorded once.
About NGC 3344
NGC 3344 is a face-on barred spiral with an inner ring and loose outer arms. Hubble's image of it shows its structure in detail, with bright foreground stars of our own Milky Way in front.
What you are looking at
NGC 3344 is a spiral of the same broad class astronomers give the Milky Way: a moderate bulge and clearly drawn arms. We look down on it almost face-on, so its structure is laid out as if on a map. From edge to edge its visible disc spans about 55,000 light-years (taking its redshift distance, which for a galaxy this near is approximate), about half the width of the Milky Way.
What astronomers have recorded
SIMBAD, the reference database astronomers use, classes it as an emission-line galaxy: its spectrum shows the glow of gas lit by young stars. One supernova has been recorded in it: SN 2012fh. It is cited in 441 scientific papers indexed by SIMBAD, and recorded there under 22 different catalogue designations.
When this light set out
The light that reaches us from NGC 3344 today set out about 28 million years ago, when Antarctica had begun to freeze. The galaxy is moving away from us at about 588 km/s (1.3 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 3344 lies in Leo Minor. It is best placed on spring evenings: around 9:30 pm in April it stands about 75° high in the south, seen from the middle of the United States.
By apparent size it is number 54 of the 12,657 galaxies on the Galaxy Origins register.
Measurements
| Catalogue | PGC 31968 |
|---|---|
| Morphological type | Sbc |
| Angular diameter | 6.70′ |
| Right ascension | 10h43m31.1s |
| Declination | +24°55′20.1″ |
| Constellation | Leo Minor |
| Inclination | 18.7° |
| Light travel time | 28 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 6.7 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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