About IC 3231
IC 3231 is a common galaxy. It sits in the constellation Com.
A galaxy: a gravitationally bound city of stars, gas and dark matter, turning so slowly that a single rotation takes hundreds of millions of years.
Common galaxy 19 EP
IC 3231
RA 185.6824° · Dec 24.8205° · openngc
Score breakdown
· 2 badgesCommon 22 pts → Uncommon
- Galaxy +14
- Spiral galaxy +5
Total score 19
3 more points to reach Uncommon.
Badges
- Galaxy · +14
- Spiral galaxy · +5
Trivia
What it actually is
- What it actually is. A galaxy: a gravitationally bound city of stars, gas and dark matter, turning so slowly that a single rotation takes hundreds of millions of years.
- Spiral. A spiral galaxy. Those arms are not solid structures but traffic jams — density waves that stars drift into and out of as they orbit.
Sense of scale
- Scale. Home to hundreds of billions of stars — a universe unto itself, and every one of those points of light could have planets.
Find it in the sky
- Where to look. You'll find it in the constellation Coma Berenices.
- Northern sky. It rides the northern half of the sky — an easier target the further north you are.
- Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around March — that's when to go looking.
Its true colour
- Its true colour. Its colour is a census: blue where gas is still collapsing into hot young stars, yellow-red in the old, settled core.
How we came to know it
- The Index Catalogue. The IC was the 1895 and 1908 supplement to the NGC — the first catalogue in history to be filled largely with objects found on photographic plates rather than by eye.
Properties
- constellation
- Com
- dso type
- G
- hubble
- Sc
- name
- IC 3231
- size arcmin
- 0.65
How to see it
Look for IC 3231 in the constellation Com.
Like any astronomical target, IC 3231 is best seen from a dark site away from city lights, and when it is above the horizon depends on your latitude and the time of year. The visibility panel above works out tonight's viewing window for your saved location.
Why IC 3231 is a common galaxy
IC 3231 scores 19 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 3 points would lift it into a rarer tier.
That score comes from 2 science badges — Galaxy and Spiral galaxy — each earned for a real, measurable property of the object. Rarity on Spacedle is never random: the more remarkable an object's astrophysics, the more badges it collects, the higher it scores, and the rarer it ranks.