This is an image of M96, a bright spiral galaxy in Leo and part of a small group of galaxies. First catalogued by Messier in 1781, it is roughly the same size as the Milky Way galaxy but has an unusually asymmetric structure.? The stars and dust in the arms aren't distributed uniformly and the galaxy core is offset from the geometric center of the disk.? The spiral arms are poorly defined and aren't delineated by the usual symmetric dust lanes.? In fact, some of the larger dust lanes curve into the galaxy nucleus.? This makes M96 markedly different from the photogenic "grand design" spiral galaxies that are visible elsewhere in the sky.? The structural irregularities are presumed to be the result of historical gravitational interactions with other galaxies in the Leo group. There are many background galaxies in the frame including a striking edge-on spiral galaxy that is peeking through the M96 disk at the 5:00 position in the image. ?The target was imaged during 6 nights in Jan-Feb 2025 using a 12.5" PlaneWave scope and a QSI-640ws camera at f/8 from SkyPi? Remote Observatories.? Seeing conditions were generally poor with turbulent winter weather conditions in New Mexico.? Total LRGB integration was 16.7 hours.
