Astral Imaging at Dogwood Ridge Observatory

Latitude: 37°48'51.0" N"
Longitude:78°23'41.0"W
Scottsville, Virginia 24590

(click on thumbnails to go to that image's page)

Discovered by William Herschel in 1784.

NGC 7331 is one of the brighter galaxies which is not included in Messier's catalog. It exposes a fine spiral structure despite its small inclination from the edge-on position. Several companions and background galaxies are visible even.

NGC 7331 was among the earliest recognized spiral galaxies, and listed by Lord Rosse in his list of 14 "spiral or curvilinear nebulae" discovered before 1850.

One supernova has been discovered in NGC 7331 so far: SN 1959D, discovered by Milton Humason at 32"W and 13"N of the galaxy's nucleus. This supernova became as bright as 13.4 mag (see IAUC 1682 and PASP 105, 1250).

NGC 7331 is contained in the SAC 110 Best NGC List. In the RASC's Finest N.G.C. Objects Objects list. Caldwell 30 in Patrick Moore's list.

This image consists of 36 RGB images all taken at -30°C at bin 2x2 for 10 minutes each. The luminance images are 15 minutes each binned 1x1 and at -30°. All data used totals 9-3/4 hours. All data was acquired using MaxImDl/CCD version 5.24 using ACP7.  Pix Insight version 1.8 was used for processing Dithered guiding was on.