Arp 262 is two superimposed galaxies. It is also known as UGC 12856
among other catalog entries. Arp classed it under "Galaxies not
classifiable as S(piral) or E(lliptical); Irregular clumps. It turns
out those irregular clumps in the southern end are actually another
galaxy. Based on red shift the main galaxy is 65 million light years
away and the companion 88 million light years away. All that really
tells us however is that the blue companion is moving away from us 28%
faster than the main galaxy. If they are really interacting differing
red shift speeds can occur at the same distance as the "fall" into each
other. They are located in the south east corner of the Great Square of
Pegasus. Pegasus is a place lots of distant galaxies are usually seen.
But this field is oddly missing the great number of faint background
galaxies I'd expect to see. NED only lists 3 galaxies within an area
larger than my field of view besides the two making up Arp 262. At
least I see a few more than that! From my search of the literature
there is very little known about this object.
Due to clouds I was able to collect only 10 minutes of color data and my
last 20 minutes of luminosity data was severely degraded. This is one I
need to retake. I'm surprised it came out as well as it did. The loss
of luminosity data doesn't explain the lack of distant background
fuzzies however. They show up in only one luminosity frame, just very
noisily, when present. They were nowhere to be seen in the two good
luminosity frames.
I found no Hubble (the telescope) images of this object. Hubble's (the
astronomer) image of it with the 200" telescope is at:
http://nedwww.ipac.caltech.edu/level...ig_arp262.jpeg
14" LX200R @ f/10, L=4x10' RGB=1x10', STL-11000XM, Paramount ME
Rick
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Correct domain name is arvig and it is net not com. Prefix is correct.
Third character is a zero rather than a capital "Oh".