Messier 88 or M88 (also designated NGC 4501) is a spiral galaxy in the constellation Coma Berenices. It has an apparent visual magnitude of 9.6 and its angular diameter is 7x4 arc-minutes. M88 lies at an estimated distance of 60 million light years. The Equinox 2000 coordinates are RA= 12h 32.1m, Dec= +14° 26´ which makes M88 best seen during the spring. The Messier Spring Star Chart shows the position of all Messier objects visible during that season.
This spiral galaxy was discovered by Messier in 1781 and is a bright member of the Virgo Cluster of galaxies. The 3rd Earl of Rosse included it in his list of 14 "spiral nebulae" in 1850. According to Stoyan et al. (2010), the distance of M88 is 57.2 million light years and its diameter is 115,000 light years. Its estimated mass is 250 billion solar masses.
Messier's Description of M88
March 18, 1781
`Nebula without star, in Virgo, between two small stars and one star of the sixth magnitude, which appear at the same time as the nebula in the field of the telescope. Its luminosity is one of the faintest, and [it] resembles the one reported in Virgo, No. 58.'
- Object: M88
- Other Names: NGC 4501
- Object Type: spiral galaxy
- Object Data: Apparent Magnitude = 9.6, Angular Size = 7x4 arc-minutes
- Object Position (Equinox 2000): RA= 12h 32.1m, Dec= +14° 26´, Constellation = Coma Berenices
- Date/Time: 2011 Apr 23 at 05:22 UTC
- Location: Bifrost Astronomical Observatory, Portal, AZ
- Mount: Astro-Physics 1200GTO
- Telescope: Takahashi Epsilon 180 Hyperbolic Astrograph
- Camera: Canon EOS 550D (Rebel T2i) (modified with a Baader UV/IR filter)
- Field of View: 1.70° x 2.56° at 1.7 arc-sec/pixel (web version: 10.0 arc-sec/pixel)
- Exposure: 4 x 300s, f/2.8, ISO 800
- File Name: M88M91-01w.jpg
- Processing (Adobe Camera Raw): Graduated Filter, Vignetting Correction, Noise Reduction, White Balance, Curves
- Processing (Photoshop CS5): Average Images, Curves, Noise Reduction
- Original Image Size: 3454 × 5179 pixels (17.9 MP); 11.5" x 17.3" @ 300 dpi
- Rights: Copyright 2011 by Fred Espenak. All Rights Reserved. See: Image Licensing.