A spiral galaxy, tilted nearly face-on to us, with a slightly unusual shape. Its spiral arms form an oval-shaped ring around the galaxy’s disk, filled with blue light from stars, as well as pink glowing gas bubbles where new stars are forming. Threads of dark red dust swirl around the brightly glowing core, blocking some of its light. The dust lanes extend into and follow the spiral arms. — Hubble · Messier 96 · ESA/Hubble & NASA, F. Belfiore, D. Calzetti

Messier 96

Galaxy in Leo · 31 million light-years

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Type	Galaxy
Constellation	Leo
Right ascension	10h 46m 46s
Declination	+11° 49′
Object distance	31 million light-years
Apparent magnitude	9.2
Apparent size	8.3′ (arc-minutes)
Approx. true diameter	74,846 light-years across
Also known as	M96 · NGC 3368

Messier 96 is a galaxy (also catalogued as NGC 3368) in the constellation Leo — an island of billions of stars far beyond our own Milky Way. It was recorded by Charles Messier in his famous catalogue of 110 deep-sky objects. It spans roughly 8.3 arc-minutes on the sky. At about magnitude 9.2, it shows up well in a small backyard telescope.

Although it appears about 8.3′ wide on the sky, its real span is roughly 74,846 light-years — the difference is a measure of how far away it lies.

Observing Messier 96

Messier 96 lies in the constellation Leo and is best placed in the evening sky around March. Its maximum altitude above the horizon depends on your latitude. Lying near the celestial equator, it can be seen from both hemispheres. A small backyard telescope will show it; binoculars may hint at it under dark skies. Note that the listed magnitude is spread across the whole object — diffuse galaxies and nebulae are often harder to see than the number alone suggests, so dark, moonless skies help a great deal.

See Messier 96 in Universe Finder

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Sources

Position, magnitude and angular size from the OpenNGC catalogue (Mattia Verga).
Object identity cross-referenced with SIMBAD (CDS, Strasbourg).
Image credits and the original observation source are linked with each photograph.

Related objects

Andromeda Galaxy — galaxy
Triangulum Galaxy — galaxy
Whirlpool Galaxy — galaxy
Sombrero Galaxy — galaxy
Messier 110 — galaxy