NGC 5861
Galaxy in the constellation Libra
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
NGC 5861 is an intermediate spiral galaxy in constellation Libra. It is located at a distance of about 85 million light years from Earth, which, given its apparent dimensions, means that NGC 5861 is about 80,000 light years across.
| NGC 5861 | |
|---|---|
 NGC 5861 imaged by PanSTARRS | |
| Observation data (J2000 epoch) | |
| Constellation | Libra |
| Right ascension | 15h 09m 16.0974s[1] |
| Declination | −11° 19′ 18.089″[1] |
| Redshift | 0.006174±0.000003[1] |
| Heliocentric radial velocity | 1,851±1 km/s[1] |
| Distance | 82.80 ± 2.64 Mly (25.387 ± 0.809 Mpc)[1] |
| Apparent magnitude (V) | 11.6 |
| Characteristics | |
| Type | SAB(rs)c [1] |
| Size | ~108,000 ly (33.11 kpc) (estimated)[1] |
| Apparent size (V) | 3.0′ × 1.7′[1] |
| Other designations | |
| IRAS 15065-1107, MCG -02-39-003, PGC 54097[1] | |
The galaxy features two long spiral arms that dominate the optical disk.[2] The one arm can be traced from its beginning at the center for nearly one and a half revolutions without branching, whereas the other starts to form fragments after one revolution, forming a moderately chaotic pattern.[3] The galaxy hosts a hydroxyl megamaser.[4]
NGC 5861 is the foremost member of a small galaxy group that also includes NGC 5858, which lies 9.6 arcmin north, forming a non-interactive pair.[5] It is located within the same galaxy cloud with NGC 5878.[6]
Supernovae
Two supernovae have been observed in NGC 5861:
- SN 1971D (type unknown, mag. 15.5) was discovered by Glenn Jolly and Justus R. Dunlap on 24 February 1971.[7][8] Observations by Hubble Space Telescope indicate that possibly there is a light echo created by SN 1971D.[9]
- SN 2017erp (Type Ia, mag. 16.8) was discovered by Kōichi Itagaki on 13 June 2017.[10]
