Picture of the Day · NASA
NGC 3660 and Burçin's Galaxy
2026-05-26
The upper galaxy might be more photogenic, but the lower galaxy is more unusual. The galaxy up top is NGC 3660, a spiral galaxy similar to our own Milky Way galaxy in that it has several bright blue spiral arms and a central bar of stars, dust, and gas. Captured by chance in the featured deep and colorful image, surprisingly, is SN 2026cff, a supernova found just to the right of the central bar. Farther in the distance is the bottom galaxy, known informally as Burçin’s galaxy, but formally cataloged as LEDA 1000714. The center of this galaxy appears to be an old elliptical galaxy, but it is strangely surrounded by not one but two rings of stars. What created Burçin's galaxy is a mystery and remains a continuing topic of research, but it likely involves the accretion of one or more smaller galaxies.
via NASA APOD
Small body data
381 Myrrha (A894 AC)
- Orbit class
- Outer Main-belt Asteroid
- Diameter
- 127.639 km
- Albedo
- 0.064
- Rotation period
- 6.572 h
- Absolute magnitude
- 8.380 H
Article
381 Myrrha is a main-belt asteroid that was discovered by the French astronomer Auguste Charlois on January 10, 1894, in Nice. It has been classified as a C-type asteroid and is most likely composed of carbonaceous material.
Photometric observations of this asteroid at the Oakley Observatory in Terre Haute, Indiana during 2006 gave a light curve with a period of 6.572 ± 0.002 hours and a brightness variation of 0.34 ± 0.05 in magnitude.