M96 Group

The M96 Group is a collection of galaxies about 30 million light years away that are gravitationally bound together. The group contains anywhere from eight to 24 galaxies, including Messier 105 (the elliptical galaxy on the left), Messier 96 (the eponymous galaxy in the lower-center of the frame), and Messier 95 (on the right).

The small blue spiral galaxy below Messier 105 is NGC 3389. It’s not part of the group because it’s almost twice as far from us as the galaxies that are in the group.

Messier 105 (M105/NGC 3379) is a large elliptical galaxy that appears as a large featureless blob. Such galaxies are usually devoid of material to form new stars. But infrared images from the Hubble Space Telescope found a faint ring of gas and dust around the core of the galaxy, indicating that it is still indeed forming new stars. Unfortunately, I don’t have an infrared camera in space, so this is the best I can do:

Messier 96 (M96/NGC 3368) is an asymmetric spiral galaxy nearby. Scientists think its gravitational connection to the other galaxies in the M96 Group is responsible for its irregular shape:

Messier 95 (M95/NGC 3351) is an intriguing barred spiral galaxy. It is replete with star-forming regions, as evidenced by the pink hydrogen-rich areas in the image. The blue tint of large swaths of its spiral arms indicate the presence of large numbers of young blue stars: