NGC 2271

NGC 2271

NGC 2271 is an elliptical galaxy in the constellation Canis Major about 121 million ly from Earth. It spans roughly 62,000 ly, about 62% of our Milky Way's width. It is receding from us at about 2,596 km/s.

Illustration from its catalogued shape, not a photograph

Elliptical
type · E-S0
121 million ly
from Earth · from redshift
62k ly
across
13.2
apparent magnitude
2,596 km/s
receding (RC3)

Because its light is 121 million ly from home, you are seeing NGC 2271 as it looked roughly 121 million years ago. The photons left before that much of history had passed, and are only now reaching us. This distance is estimated from the galaxy's redshift, so the lookback time is approximate.

Nearest galaxies
NGC 2263Barred spiral8.8 million ly
apart
NGC 2223Barred spiral11 million ly
apart
NGC 2216Spiral13 million ly
apart
NGC 2227Spiral16 million ly
apart
IC 2163Spiral17 million ly
apart
NGC 2296Elliptical17 million ly
apart
Worlds in the same direction on the sky

Source: structural data (position, morphology, brightness, redshift) from OpenNGC (CC BY-SA). Recession velocity from RC3 (de Vaucouleurs et al. 1991, via NASA/HEASARC, public domain). Distance computed by gravityfinder from redshift via Hubble's law (H0 = 70 km/s/Mpc).

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