| Quoted from SEDS
Discovered 1780 by Charles Messier.
Messier 65 (M65, NGC 3623), together with its neighbors
M66 and
NGC 3628,
forms a most conspicuous triplet of galaxies, the
Leo Triplett or
M66 group, located at a distance of about 35 million light years.
Although it is close to and thus under the gravitational influence of
its neighbors, M65 looks like a very "normal" Sa type spiral and seems
to have felt little influence. It has a prominent central lense and
tightly wound spiral arms, plus a prominent dust lane marking the facing
edge. The luminous disk is dominated by a smooth old stellar population.
Near the lane, some knots are visible, which, according to J.D. Wray,
may be associated with star forming regions. The lane may hide regions
of star formation usually associated with such features in spiral
galaxies.
M65, together with its neighbor, M66, has been discovered by
Charles
Messier, who
cataloged it on March 1, 1780, describes it as "very faint nebula
without stars." Because of a dubious error,
Admiral Smyth
has assigned
this discovery of M65 and M66 (and
M68) to
Pierre
Méchain, a view which was adopted by
Kenneth Glyn
Jones somewhen in the 1960s, and consequently, in many sources,
despite the fact that Messier doesn't acknowledge such a prior sighting,
which he did in all other cases.
Discovered 1780 by Charles Messier.
Messier 66 (M66, NGC 3627), together with its neighbors
M65 and
NGC 3628,
forms a most conspicuous triplet of galaxies, the
Leo Triplett or
M66 group, located at a distance of about 35 million light years.
M66 is considerably larger than its neighbor,
M65, and has a
well developed but not well defined central bulge, and is therefore
classified Sb. Obviously its spiral arms are deformed, probably because
of the encounters with its neighbors. They seem to be distorted and
displaced above the plane of the galaxy. Note how one of the spiral arms
seems to pass over the left side of the central bulge. Much dust is
visible here, as well as a few pink nebulae, signs of star formation,
near the end of one of the arms.
Together with its neighbor M65, M66 has been discovered by
Charles
Messier, who
cataloged it on March 1, 1780, remarks that he missed these two
objects in 1773, when a comet passed between them on November 1 to 2,
1773, probably because of the light of the comet. Because of a dubious
error,
Admiral Smyth has
assigned
this discovery of M65 and M66 (and
M68) to
Pierre
Méchain, a view which was adopted by
Kenneth Glyn
Jones somewhen in the 1960s, and consequently, in many modern
sources, despite the fact that Messier doesn't acknowledge such a prior
sighting, which he did in all other cases.
Three supernovae have appeared in this galaxy:
- 1973R which was of type II and reached mag 15 was found on Dec
12, 1973.
- 1989B
was discovered on Jan 31, 1989 and became as bright as mag 12.2 on
Feb 1, 1989.
-
1997bs was discovered by the Lick Observatory Supernova Search
Team as it occurred on April 15, 1997 at 13" west, 67" south of the
galaxy's center and reached mag 17.0; this was of peculiar type IIn.
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