UGC 2886A, Pole Galaxy
How does one actually come to observe a rather boring galaxy without any structures and then make a drawing of it? Well, actually it's quite simple: you read an
article in the magazine "Sky and Telescope" about galaxies around the northern celestial pole. The question was, which is the northernmost galaxy that you can
visually observe with an amateur telescope. And before you know it, you have a new observing project.
There's not really much to say about UGC 2886 itself. It is small and located at a declination of +88°46', so it stands a little more than a degree from the celestial
pole. That's not a record yet, but it's pretty good. From the redshift an approximate distance of 80 million light years can be determined. From the apparent size
of 1.0'x0.2' the true diameter can be calculated to be 23,000 light years. So the galaxy seems to be very small. This is supported by an absolute magnitude of
M= -15.0mag, which gives UGC 2886A a luminosity of only 80 million suns. However, since we see the galaxy from the side, the true luminosity will surely be
much higher.
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And what do you see? To be honest, not very much. With 20" aperture only a very pale, diffuse patch of light was visible - and this only with averted vision.
So if you are not enthusiastic about observing a galaxy close to the northern celestial pole, you don't really have to see UGC 2886A. ;)
