NGC 7331 Deer Lick Galaxy Group

The Deer Lick Galaxy Group is really only a visual grouping of galaxies in the constellation Pegasus.

 

The large, spiral galaxy NGC 7331 in the centre of this picture is a foreground galaxy in the same field of view as the collection known as the Deer Lick Group. It contains four other members, affectionately referred to as the "fleas": the lenticular or unbarred spirals NGC 7335 and NGC 7336, the barred spiral galaxy NGC 7337 and the elliptical galaxy NGC 7340. These galaxies lie at distances of approximately 332, 365, 348 and 294 million light years, respectively.

 

Although adjacent on the sky, this collection is not a galaxy group, as NGC 7331 itself is not gravitationally associated with the far more distant "fleas"; indeed, even they are separated by far more than the normal distances (~2 million light years) of a galaxy group.

 

Even so, it is nice to be able to capture so many galaxies in one shot.

 

 

Telescope: Celestron C11-A XLT Schmidt Cassegrain OTA

Mount: SkyWatcher EQ6-R Pro

 

Controller: ZWO ASIAIR Pro

Main Camera: ZWO ASI533MC Pro at -10C

Filter: ZWO UV/IR Cut filter

Focuser: ZWO EAF

Guide Camera: ZWO ASI174MM Mini guidecam

Guide via: ZWO OAG

 

Stacked from:

Lights 93 at 120 seconds, gain 101, temp -10C

Darks 30 at 120 seconds, gain 101, temp -10C

Flat 30 at 1.14s, gain 101, temp -10C

Dark Flat 30 at 1.14s, gain 101 temp -10C

 

Bortle 4 sky.

Integrated the saved frames in Astro Pixel Processor.

Processed in PixInsight.

Captions added in Photoshop CS4

 

Done