NGC 908

NGC 908 is an unbarred spiral galaxy in the constellation Cetus. It was discovered on 20 September 1786 by William Herschel.^[3] This galaxy is 56 million light years away from Earth. It is the main galaxy in the NGC 908 group, which also includes NGC 899, NGC 907, and IC 223.^[4]

NGC 908
NGC 908 imaged by the Very Large Telescope of ESO.
Observation data (J2000 epoch)
Constellation	Cetus
Right ascension	02h 23m 04.6s[1]
Declination	−21° 14′ 02″[1]
Redshift	1509 ± 5 km/s[1]
Distance	56.0 ± 5.7 Mly (17.2 ± 1.8 Mpc)[1]
Group or cluster	NGC 908 group
Apparent magnitude (V)	10.83[2]
Characteristics
Type	SA(s)c [1]
Apparent size (V)	6′.0 × 2′.6[1]
Other designations
UGCA 27, MCG -04-06-035, PGC 9057[2]

Appearance

NGC 908 has vigorous star formation and is a starburst galaxy. The galaxy has a three-arm spiral pattern; two of its arms have peculiar morphology. The galaxy has a bright central bulge. Clusters of young stars and star-forming knots can be seen in the arms. Starburst activity and the peculiar morphology of the galaxy indicate it had a close encounter with another galaxy, although none are visible now.^[5]

Stars observed

Two supernovae have been observed in NGC 908:

• SN 1994ai (type Ic, mag. 17) was discovered by Robert McNaught on 20 December 1994.^[6][7]
• SN 2006ce (type Ia, mag. 12.4) was discovered by Libert "Berto" Monard on 10 May 2006.^[8][9]

Also, one luminous blue variable has been observed in this galaxy: AT 2021ablz (type LBV, mag. 20.6) was discovered by Pan-STARRS on 14 October 2021.^[10]

See also

• List of NGC objects (1–1000)