Spiral Galaxies NGC 5278, NGC 5279 (Arp 239),
& Spiral Galaxies UGC 8671 and MCG +9-22-94
Supernova 2001ai

Supernova 2001ai:

• Discovered: March 28th, 2001, by the LOTOSS group at Lick Observatory.
• Magnitude 17.6 at discovery, and 17.1 in the Kopernik image.
• Type Ic

Follow this Link to a NASA Web site on supernovas. It has a very nice animation and a description of what these objects are.

Spiral Galaxies NGC 5278 and NGC 5279 (aka Arp 239) in the Constellation of Ursa Major form an M-51-like interacting pair. This group is sometimes called the "telephone receiver". The galaxies are not only connected via one spiral arm like M-51, but they also have a dimmer bridge between their disks. Spiral galaxies UGC 8671 and MCG +9-22-94 do not have measured red shifts and thus there is no data on their distances. They may well be a part of a small cluster of galaxies that includes the "telephone receiver", but this is not determined at this time.

Using the red shift data from the “NASA Extra-galactic Data Base(NED)”, (and a Hubble Constant of 62 Km per sec., per Megaparsec), one can calculate a rough distance estimate for the Arp 239 pair, and SN 2001 ai, of about 400 million light years.

NGC 5278 (Arp 239a) Magnitude: 13.5 Constellation: Ursa Major RA: 13h 41m 39.2s Dec: +55° 40' 12" Epoch 2000 Size (mins): 1.4' x 0.9' Classification: SA(s)b? Pec        Spiral, S-shaped, peculiar (uncertain) Deep Sky Field Guide:        "Very small, very bright nucleus, strongly asymmetrical, interacting with NGC 5279."	NGC 5279 (Arp 239b) Magnitude: 15.0 Constellation: Ursa Major RA: 13h 41m 43.7s Dec: +55° 40' 23" Epoch 2000 Size (mins): 0.6' x 0.4' Classification: SB(s)a pec        Barred Spiral, S-shaped, peculiar Dreyer description in the NGC:     "Faint, very small, eastward of 2."
UGC 8671 Magnitude: 14.5 RA: 13h 41m 24.3s Dec: +55° 38' 34" Epoch 2000 Size (mins): 0.6' x 0.4' Classification: Spiral Galaxy	MCG 9-22-94 Magnitude: 14.1 RA: 13h 41m 16.1s Dec: +55° 40' 53" Epoch 2000 Size (mins): 0.5' x 0.2' Classification: Spiral Galaxy

Click below to

George Normandin, KAS

April 22nd, 2001