![[NGC7332/7339]](/image_gallery/images/d4/n7332b.jpg)
Paired galaxies NGC7332, type S0 (on the right, with its distinctive peanut-shaped bulge) and NGC7339, type Sbc (left, edge-on), are a dynamically isolated binary system (number 570 in the catalog by Igor Karachentsev).
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NGC7332 is the brighter galaxy to the right (west) of the image.
It shows evidence of partial dust lanes, has an extended envelope
and possesses a compressed, bright, box-like central bulge.
It is classified S0(pec), being an intermediate lenticular galaxy,
and its peculiar tag refers to the unusual box-like shape of the
central region (sometimes called peanut-shaped).
The accompanying NGC7339 is seen edge-on and is thought to be of
type Sbc (a mixed spiral), but its orientation makes it hard to
classify exactly. It is also somewhat dimmer than its companion,
although at a distance of about sixty million light-years, neither is
visible to the naked eye.
Receding from us at over eight hundred miles per second, they are
orbiting each other at about sixty miles per second. This isn't as
fast as it sounds for galaxies which are about a million
trillion miles across.
This image is a combination of observations made with the Kitt Peak
National Observatory's 0.9-meter telescope in November of 1998.
Minimum credit line: Doug Williams, N.A.Sharp/NOAO/AURA/NSF
(for details see Conditions of Use)
600 x 400 10 kb color JPEG
1024 x 683 25 kb color JPEG
1024 x 683 696 kb 8-bit color TIFF
1024 x 683 2.0 Mb 24-bit color TIFF
This pair of galaxies is in the constellation Pegasus.
A dynamically isolated binary system (number 570 in the catalog of
double galaxies compiled by
Igor Karachentsev), NGC7332 and 7339 are too far apart for obvious
interaction (such as tails and streamers), although they are almost
certainly orbiting around each other.
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spiral galaxies page.
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