Markarian Chain – The heart of the Virgo ClusterI converted my image to B&W & included a negative for ease of seeing the fainter galaxies, with ID’s. Some are as faint as 18th magnitude, and I did not have time to label them all…but The Virgo Clust

Comprising approximately 1300 (and possibly up to 2000) member galaxies, the cluster forms the heart of the larger Virgo Supercluster, of which the Local Group is an outlying member.

Markarian’s Chain is a stretch of galaxies that forms part of the Virgo Cluster. It is called a chain because, when viewed from Earth, the galaxies lie along a smoothly curved line. It was named after the Armenian astrophysicist, B. E. Markarian, who discovered their common motion in the early 1960s.

Member galaxies include M84 (NGC 4374), M86 (NGC 4406), NGC 4477, NGC 4473, NGC 4461, NGC 4458, NGC 4438 and NGC 4435 and many other PGC & IC Galaxies. Sorry but I did not have time to label them all.

It is located at RA 12h 27m and Dec +13° 10′.

At least seven galaxies in the chain appear to move coherently, although others appear to be superposed by chance.

What does M, NGC, IC, & PGC refer to you ask??

M – Messier Object Number
The Messier objects are a set of 110 astronomical objects first listed by French astronomer Charles Messier in 1771. Messier was a comet hunter, and was frustrated by objects which resembled but were not comets, so he compiled a list of them.

NGC- New General Catalog
The New General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars (abbreviated as NGC) is a well-known catalogue of deep-sky
objects compiled by John Louis Emil Dreyer in 1888 as a new version of John Herschel’s General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars.
The NGC contains 7,840 objects, known as the NGC objects. It is one of the largest comprehensive catalogues, as it includes all types of deep space objects and is not confined to, for example, galaxies.

IC – Index Catalog
Dreyer also published two supplements to the NGC in 1895 and 1908,
known as the Index Catalogues, describing a further 5,386 astronomical objects.

PGC – Principal Galaxies
The Catalogue of Principal Galaxies (PGC) is an astronomical catalog published in 1989 that lists B1950 and J2000
equatorial coordinates and cross-identifications for 73,197 galaxies.

back in April..
While waiting for the Comet to Rise…
I captured this 72 minute exposure(4 min subs x 18) using a Baader Modified Canon Rebel Xsi, & 5.5 inch F5 Newt. Reflector at my Observatories in Yellow Springs, Ohio on 04-12-2016. The Line in the image is a satellite trail as it passed through the Field of View, this happens a lot in long exposures!

Best Regards,
John Chumack
www.galacticimages.com