Modern analogue of NGC

Modern analogue of NGC

There are astronomical objects that attract with their unique and unusual names, obtained in honor of the mythical heroes or as a display of their appearance. Just remember the Sombrero galaxy, the constellation of Orion (Hunter), the Horsehead Nebula or our Milky Way galaxy. But these are only excellent exceptions, since most of the objects are called abbreviated scientific names based on time and order of stay.

Hubble is now watching the two galaxies. The larger one is NGC 4424. It was added to the list of the General Catalog of Nebulae and Star Clusters (NGC) created in 1888. This is one of the largest astronomical lists, so many Hubble images show objects from this list. There are 7840 entries in the catalog. Moreover, most celestial bodies are incredibly attractive and bright, so they were noticed very early. Under NGC 4424 is a bright, but flat and smaller galaxy LEDA 213994. The League-Medona extragalactic database (Lyon-Meudon Extragalactic Database - LEDA) is much more modern than NGC. It was created in the Lyon Observatory in 1983. Now it has millions of entries. Of course, the objects in both directories overlap, but many of the entries in the NGC still remain under the original names, because they were given before. You may have noticed that the second directory should have shrunk as LMED. But the bottom line is that astronomers still love to compare science with mythology, which is why they chose LEDA - this is the name of the princess in the myths of ancient Greece.

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