Cosmic contrasts – SBcd galaxy NGC 3319 and galaxy cluster Abell 1056

About the Object

A star, a galaxy and a galaxy cluster forming this nice example. The main player here is NGC3319 at the center, a nice SBcd galaxy with considerably recent star formation resulting in a very distinct blue color. Despite its considerable apparent extension, NGC3319 is a not very frequently visited galaxy on astrobin. NGC3319 is at a distance of about 33MLy. Like so many galaxies it was discovered by William Herschel in 1788. NGC 3319 is a Seyfert galaxy, with an AGN. It is a candidate for hosting an intermediate mass black hole. So a quite interesting object!

In the lower left corner is Abell 1056, a galaxy cluster at a redshift of about 0.125. While the cluster does not impress by any of its intrinsic properties I was quite excited about PGC2186455 at the upper left corner of the cluster, which show very strong tidal features!

last but not least, on the opposite side of NGC3319, is TYC3011-1917-1, the brightest star on the image: an 8th magnitude star with a parallax of about 3mas, i.e. it is some 300pc away from us complementing the cosmic contrast sample.

Observation Notes

Data were taken on 2025 March 26, 27, 28, and 29

Technical Details

View the full-resolution image together with complete acquisition and processing details on AstroBin.