NGC 2537 - Bear Paw Galaxy
Because of its appearance, the galaxy NGC 2537 (Arp 6) is also known as the "bear paw galaxy". With a brightness of 12.3mag, it is located around
20 million light-years away from Earth in the constellation Lynx. The galaxy was discovered in February 1788 by the german astronomer F.W. Herschel.
With a diameter of just 1.7', NGC 2537 not only appears very small in the sky, with a true diameter of just 10,000 light-years it actually is. For this
reason and because of its bluish color, it belongs to the dwarf galaxies of type "bcd" (blue compact dwarf). The shape is explained by the fact that it
is a merging galaxy, which therefore even has some bright star-forming regions.
However, it does not interact with the two neighboring galaxies IC 2233 and NGC 2537A (they are only an optical pair as they are separated by 570
million light-years).
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In a 20" Dobsonian, the small galaxy appears very bright and is easy to see. The unusual shape is also easy to recognize.
With a high magnification (V=270x), the star-forming regions can also be identified with a close look. The two brightest ones are located in the western
part of the galaxy - in the upper one there is even a very faint star that could be a supercluster. NGC 2537A is visible to the east of the galaxy (left).
Great object! :))
