NGC 4586 — Sa in Virgo
Sa in Virgo, 3.4 arcminutes across, its light 38 million years old. Measured by HyperLEDA, photographed by Pan-STARRS1. Recorded once.
About NGC 4586
What you are looking at
NGC 4586 is an early-type spiral: a large, bright central bulge wrapped in smooth, tightly wound arms. Its disc is turned almost exactly side-on to us: the galaxy appears as a narrow blade of light, and its dust as a dark seam running along it. From edge to edge its visible disc spans about 38,000 light-years (taking its redshift distance, which for a galaxy this near is approximate), about a third 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. It is cited in 162 scientific papers indexed by SIMBAD, and recorded there under 20 different catalogue designations.
When this light set out
Its light has been travelling for about 38 million years. When it left, the planet had come through its hottest interval since the dinosaurs. The galaxy is moving away from us at about 783 km/s (1.8 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
In the sky, NGC 4586 sits within the constellation Virgo. It is best placed on spring evenings: around 9:30 pm in May it stands about 54° 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 4580 (1.1° away on the sky, at least 700,000 light-years from it); NGC 4630 (1.1° away on the sky, at least 700,000 light-years from it); NGC 4600 (1.3° away on the sky, at least 850,000 light-years from it); NGC 4587 (1.7° away on the sky, at least 1,090,000 light-years from it), and 7 more.
By apparent size it is number 373 of the 12,657 galaxies on the Galaxy Origins register.
Measurements
| Catalogue | PGC 42241 |
|---|---|
| Morphological type | Sa |
| Angular diameter | 3.43′ |
| Right ascension | 12h38m28.4s |
| Declination | +04°19′08.7″ |
| Constellation | Virgo |
| Inclination | 86.7° |
| Light travel time | 38 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 3.4 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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