Messier 84 - Galaxy
Messier 84 is a large galaxy with a brightness of 9.2mag and a size of 7'x6' (arcminutes) in the constellation "Virgo", that was discovered by Johann
Köhler in May 1779.
At a distance of around 43 million light-years, it is located in the center of the well-known Virgo galaxy cluster. The elliptical galaxy of type E1 (today
more likely S0) has a diameter of 105,000 light-years. Its true brightness is M= -22.4mag, which corresponds to a luminosity of around 80 billion suns.
In total, the galaxy is home to an incredible number of over 500 billion stars. The last supernova occurred in 1991.
At the center of Messier 84 there is a supermassive black hole (SMBH) with a mass of 1.5 billion solar masses. It is ejecting matter in the form of two
jets and is surrounded by a rotating disk of hot gas and dust.
The galaxy has a massive halo of dark matter and is orbited by almost 1,800 globular clusters.
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In my 20" telescope, Messier 84 appears very bright at a magnification of 210x due to its high surface brightness - even brighter than the neighboring galaxy
Messier 86.
The galaxy has a bright central region in which there is a very bright stellar core, which is an indication of the extremely high stellar density in this region and
provides an insight into the processes taking place there. Very exciting. :) Apart from that, no other structures are visible (as is usual for an elliptical galaxy).
