M59

elliptical galaxy · Virgo Cluster

48.6 million light-years from Earth

A flattened elliptical galaxy, found by Johann Gottfried Koehler in April 1779 while he followed a comet, the same night as its neighbour M60. At its very centre a core only about 160 light-years across spins the opposite way to the rest of the galaxy.

• 48.6 million light-years · about 65,000 light-years across
• a few million light-years nearer than the cluster's middle

kind

galaxy

catalogue

M59 · NGC 4621

size

65,000 light-years across