NGC 4945

From Simple English Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

NGC 4945 is a barred spiral galaxy located 11.7 million light years away from the Earth in the constellation of Centaurus. It is visible near the stars Xi¹ Centauri and Xi² Centauri. It was discovered in 1826 by James Dunlop. It is similar to the Milky Way, but has an energetic Seyfert 2 nucleus that may have a supermassive black hole. The galaxy has a disk of dust, gas, and many star clusters.[1] It has a mass of about 1.4×10^11 M.

Picture taken by ESO of the galaxy

NGC 4945 has two supernovae observed: SN 2005af (Type II, magnitude 12.8)[2] and SN 2011ja (Type IIP, magnitude 14).[3]

Galaxy group[change | change source]

NGC 4945 is one of the brightest galaxies of the Centaurus A/M83 Group, a big, nearby group of galaxies. The galaxy is the second brightest galaxy in the subgroup centered on Centaurus A.[4][5]

References[change | change source]

  1. "NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database". Results for NGC 4945. Retrieved 2006-11-25.
  2. Transient Name Server entry for SN 2005af. Retrieved 25 March 2023.
  3. Transient Name Server entry for SN 2011ja. Retrieved 25 March 2023.
  4. I. D. Karachentsev; M. E. Sharina; A. E. Dolphin; E. K. Grebel; et al. (2002). "New distances to galaxies in the Centaurus A group". Astronomy and Astrophysics. 385 (1): 21–31. Bibcode:2002A&A...385...21K. doi:10.1051/0004-6361:20020042.
  5. I. D. Karachentsev (2005). "The Local Group and Other Neighboring Galaxy Groups". Astronomical Journal. 129 (1): 178–188. arXiv:astro-ph/0410065. Bibcode:2005AJ....129..178K. doi:10.1086/426368. S2CID 119385141.