Arp 262 is two superimposed galaxies. It is also known as UGC 12856 among other catalog entries. Arp classed it under "Galaxies not classifiable as S(piral) or E(lliptical); Irregular clumps. It turns out those irregular clumps in the southern end are actually another galaxy. Based on red shift the main galaxy is 65 million light years away and the companion 88 million light years away. All that really tells us however is that the blue companion is moving away from us 28% faster than the main galaxy. If they are really interacting, differing red shift speeds can occur at the same distance as they "fall" into each other.

They are located in the south east corner of the Great Square of Pegasus. Pegasus is a place lots of distant galaxies are usually seen. But this field is oddly missing the great number of faint background galaxies I'd expect to see. NED only lists 3 galaxies within an area larger than my field of view besides the two making up Arp 262. At least I see a few more than that! From my search of the literature there is very little known about this object.

Due to clouds I was able to collect only 10 minutes of color data and my last 20 minutes of luminosity data was severely degraded. This is one I need to retake. I'm surprised it came out as well as it did. The loss of luminosity data doesn't explain the lack of distant background fuzzies however. They would show up in only one luminosity frame, just very noisily, when present. They were nowhere to be seen in the two good luminosity frames at any noise level. The attached image is a crop of the full image since there's little else in the image of interest.

I found no Hubble (the telescope) images of this object. Hubble's (the astronomer) image of it with the 200" telescope is at:
http://nedwww.ipac.caltech.edu/level...ig_arp262.jpeg

Full image at:
http://www.spacebanter.com/attachmen...tid=2486&stc=1

14" LX200R @ f/10, L=4x10' RGB=1x10', STL-11000XM, Paramount ME

Rick

Attached Images

ARP262-UGC12856L4X10RGB1X10X3R1-CROP.jpg (64.0 KB, 24 views)

It almost looks like a helix. Very nice.

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Observatorio de la Ballona

Wow, that is amazing. So glad I joined this forum.

Parrappa,
Welcome to the forum. If you are interested in Arp galaxies like this pair, work your way back through the archives. I've been averaging about 2 a week posted here for some time now. I do digress sometimes into other objects but of late my main targets have been strange galaxies. Arp's catalog is a good starting point for this quest.

Rick

I'll do that, thanks for the suggestion and the warm welcome.

Hello Rick:
Every day you offer to our eyes, objects very distant and difficult to photograph, and a always precise explanation.
Many greetings
Cesar

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http://www.astrophoto.com.mx

Hi Rick, Another impressive image and info like Cesar said. I have learned more of these impressive images and info then from reading it from the books. Great job and Clear Skies my friend.

what a beautiful view