VII Zw 770 a strange two or three ring galaxy

VII Zw 770 is a strange galaxy northeast of the head of Draco about 420 million light-years away by its redshift. NED classifies it as N galaxy? Those are defined as: "A galaxy with a small, bright, blue nucleus superposed on a much fainter red background. In terms of form, color, spectrum, redshift, and optical and radio variability, N galaxies are intermediate between quasars and Seyfert galaxies. The "N" designation comes from the Morgan classification."

If you've never heard of this system here's a short version: "A scheme invented by William Morgan that uses the integrated spectrum of the stars of a galaxy together with its shape (real and apparent) and its degree of central concentration. It specifies the galactic spectral type, a, af, f, fg, g, gk, or k (corresponding to the integrated stellar types); the form, type S (spiral), B (barred spiral), E (elliptical), I (irregular), Ep (elliptical with dust absorption), D (rotational symmetry without pronounced spiral or elliptical structure), L (low surface brightness), or N (small bright nucleus); and the inclination to the line of sight, from 1 (face-on) to 7 (edge-on). For example, the Andromeda Galaxy is classified as kS5."

To me it looks like a typical small elliptical with two non concentric rings with one centered to the right and one to the left of the core. But the CGPG says of it: "Red elliptical compact surrounded by blue ring and two blue partial ring-like clouds beyond." That's three rings, two incomplete. I can't say I see that third ring nor do they appear blue, more white with a slight red tinge. I have no idea what is meant by the word "beyond".

Down and to the left is an edge on galaxy with a small apparent galaxy off its northern ansa. It appears slightly warped to me. Unfortunately it isn't listed as a galaxy at NED only as an Ultraviolet source picked up by the Galex Uv satellite. The object to the north isn't in NED at all. Like everything else in the field there's no distance data for it. Only a handful of galaxies in the field are even listed at NED as galaxies. Many others as UvS objects but considering the vast majority of the UvS objects listed are just stars I can't easily distinguish between a star-like galaxy or star and with many hundred, all with only approximate positions I didn't even try. Thus there's no annotated image with this image.

The only other galaxy worth mentioning is 2MASX J18100635+5822556 directly east of VII Zw 770. It shows two unequal faint diffuse arms. NED has nothing on it, not even a magnitude. Draco is a part of the sky mostly ignored by galaxy research. Because of this no annotated image was made.

14" LX200R @ f/10, L=4x10' RGB=2x10', STL-11000XM, Paramount ME

Rick

Rick,

at 420 million light-years this must be a large galaxy.
The warped edge-on also is very interesting.

Stefan


"WA0CKY" schrieb im Newsbeitrag ...


VII Zw 770 is a strange galaxy northeast of the head of Draco about 420
million light-years away by its redshift. NED classifies it as N
galaxy? Those are defined as: "A galaxy with a small, bright, blue
nucleus superposed on a much fainter red background. In terms of form,
color, spectrum, redshift, and optical and radio variability, N galaxies
are intermediate between quasars and Seyfert galaxies. The "N"
designation comes from the Morgan classification."

If you've never heard of this system here's a short version: "A scheme
invented by William Morgan that uses the integrated spectrum of the
stars of a galaxy together with its shape (real and apparent) and its
degree of central concentration. It specifies the galactic spectral
type, a, af, f, fg, g, gk, or k (corresponding to the integrated stellar
types); the form, type S (spiral), B (barred spiral), E (elliptical), I
(irregular), Ep (elliptical with dust absorption), D (rotational
symmetry without pronounced spiral or elliptical structure), L (low
surface brightness), or N (small bright nucleus); and the inclination to
the line of sight, from 1 (face-on) to 7 (edge-on). For example, the
Andromeda Galaxy is classified as kS5."

To me it looks like a typical small elliptical with two non concentric
rings with one centered to the right and one to the left of the core.
But the CGPG says of it: "Red elliptical compact surrounded by blue ring
and two blue partial ring-like clouds beyond." That's three rings, two
incomplete. I can't say I see that third ring nor do they appear blue,
more white with a slight red tinge. I have no idea what is meant by the
word "beyond".

Down and to the left is an edge on galaxy with a small apparent galaxy
off its northern ansa. It appears slightly warped to me. Unfortunately
it isn't listed as a galaxy at NED only as an Ultraviolet source picked
up by the Galex Uv satellite. The object to the north isn't in NED at
all. Like everything else in the field there's no distance data for it.
Only a handful of galaxies in the field are even listed at NED as
galaxies. Many others as UvS objects but considering the vast majority
of the UvS objects listed are just stars I can't easily distinguish
between a star-like galaxy or star and with many hundred, all with only
approximate positions I didn't even try. Thus there's no annotated
image with this image.

The only other galaxy worth mentioning is 2MASX J18100635+5822556
directly east of VII Zw 770. It shows two unequal faint diffuse arms.
NED has nothing on it, not even a magnitude. Draco is a part of the sky
mostly ignored by galaxy research. Because of this no annotated image
was made.

14" LX200R @ f/10, L=4x10' RGB=2x10', STL-11000XM, Paramount ME

Rick


--
WA0CKY