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Rare galaxy 35 EP

IC 4931

RA 300.2098° · Dec -38.5751° · openngc

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Score breakdown

· 5 badges
35 pts · Rare
Rare 50 pts → Epic
  • Galaxy +14
  • Toward the galactic centre +8
  • Outside our galaxy entirely +6
  • Elliptical galaxy +4
  • On the zodiac +3
Total score 35

15 more points to reach Epic.

Badges

  • Galaxy · +14
  • Outside our galaxy entirely · +6
  • Elliptical galaxy · +4
  • Toward the galactic centre · +8
  • On the zodiac · +3

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.
  • Elliptical. An elliptical galaxy: a smooth swarm of stars on randomly tilted orbits, with almost no cold gas left to build anything new.

Sense of scale

  • In perspective. Deep in the extragalactic distance — further than the entire Virgo Cluster of galaxies.
  • 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

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 11.9 you'll want a small backyard telescope, over in Sagittarius.
  • Southern sky. It rides the southern half of the sky — an easier target the further south you are.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around July — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

  • Verdict. Impossible with our current technology — and the next millennium of it.

Properties

constellation
Sgr
dist ly
281087001.2896
dso type
G
hubble
E
mag
11.88
name
IC 4931
radial velocity kms
5972
redshift
0.0201
size arcmin
2.28
surface brightness
23.57

About IC 4931

IC 4931 is a rare galaxy. It lies about 281,087,001.3 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Sgr and shines at apparent magnitude 11.88.

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.

How to see it

Look for IC 4931 in the constellation Sgr. At apparent magnitude 11.88, a small backyard telescope will bring it into view.

Like any astronomical target, IC 4931 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 4931 is a rare galaxy

IC 4931 scores 35 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 15 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 5 science badges — Galaxy, Outside our galaxy entirely, Elliptical galaxy, Toward the galactic centre and On the zodiac — 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.