The Cosmos with NGC 4026

NGC 4026 is a lenticular galaxy in the constellation Ursa Major. It is located at a distance of circa 50 million light years from Earth, which, given its apparent dimensions, means that NGC 4026 is about 80,000 light years across. It was discovered by William Herschel on April 12, 1789. The galaxy hosts a supermassive black hole with estimated mass 108.33±0.109 (166-275 million) MNGC 4026 belongs to M109 Group, the largest subgroup of galaxies with the Ursa Major Cluster. In the vicinity of NGC 4026 lie some low surface brightness spiral galaxies, UGC 6917 (42 arcminutes from NGC 4026), UGC 6922 (26 arcminutes from NGC 4026) and UGC 6956 (10 arcminutes from NGC 4026).

NGC 4026 appears disturbed in HI imaging, with a filament extending southward. The mass of HI in NGC 4026 is below 0.71 × 108 M⊙. The total HI mass in NGC 4026, UGC 6956 and the HI filament is estimated to be 7.94 × 108 M⊙

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