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
Key facts
- Discovered by
- Max Wolf
- Discovery site
- Heidelberg
- Discovery date
- 24 August 1903
- Alternative designations
- 1903 MB
- Adjectives
- Armidian
- Observation arc
- 112.50 yr (41092 d)
- Aphelion
- 3.1722 AU (474.55 Gm )
- Perihelion
- 2.9197 AU (436.78 Gm)
- Semi major axis
- 3.0460 AU (455.68 Gm)
- Orbital period sidereal
- 5.32 yr (1941.7 d )
- Mean anomaly
- 52.051 °
- Mean motion
- 0° 11 7.44 / day
- Inclination
- 3.8766°
Article
514 Armida is a minor planet orbiting the Sun. According to the Catalogue of Minor Planet Names and Discovery Circumstances, it is "named for the beautiful legendary sorceress in Torquato Tasso’s (1544–1595) Jerusalem Delivered. She is the leading character in the opera Armida (composed 1777) by Christoph Willibald Gluck (1714–1787)." (Numerous other composers have written "Armida" operas; see Armida.)
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