​                                                    NGC 3628 Galaxy - The Hamburger galaxy

     NGC 3628, also known as the Hamburger Galaxy or Sarah’s Galaxy, is a famous unbarred spiral galaxy located in Leo constellation.The Hamburger Galaxy is about 100,000 light years across and occupies an area of 15 by 3.6 arc minutes of apparent sky. It can be found only 0.5 degrees to the north of the galaxy pair Messier 65 and Messier 66, between the relatively bright stars Theta and Iota Leonis. The Hamburger Galaxy has an apparent magnitude of 10.2 and lies at an approximate distance of 35 million light years from Earth.

    NGC 3628 forms the famous Leo Triplet (M66 Group) with the spiral galaxies, Messier 65 and Messier 66. It is the faintest member of the group and the only galaxy in the Leo Triplet that was not catalogued by Charles Messier. It went undetected by the French astronomer and was not discovered until the late 18th century.

    It was discovered by William Herschel in 1784. He catalogued it as H V.8 on April 8 of that year. The Hamburger Galaxy is known for its broad equatorial band of dust and a vast tidal tail, spanning approximately 300,000 light years. The dust band obscures the galaxy’s central region and the bright young stars that have formed in its spiral  arms. Composed of young open star clusters and starburst regions, the galaxy’s tidal tail is believed to be a result of gravitational interaction with the other galaxies in the M66 Group. The stream of stars has been drawn out by tidal forces during violent encounters with the galaxy’s large neighbours.

    The interaction with M65 and M66 is also believed to be responsible for the warped disk of NGC 3628. A spectroscopic analysis of the galaxy’s disk has revealed that the stars in NGC 3628 orbit in the opposite direction of the gas in the galaxy, likely as a result of a recent galactic merger.The Hamburger Galaxy shares its name with Centaurus A, the fifth brightest galaxy in the sky, located in the constellation Centaurus.

            Messier Objects.

Technical Info:

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Optics :          GSO 8" RC + CCDT67 @ F5.4 @ 1058 mm

Camera :        Atik - 414 EX Mono + EFW2 Filter Wheel

Filters :          Astrodon Gen 2 E-Series - RGB Filter Set - 1.25"

                     Astrodon 5nm H-Alpha Narrowband Filter - 1.25"

Mount :          NEQ-6 Pro (Self Hypertuned/Belt Mod)​

Guiding:         Atik OAG + SX Lodestar 2

Acquisition :    Sequence Generator Pro (2.5.0.23) 

Exposure :       L     (1x1) - 38 x 300     3 Hours 10 Minutes 

                      R     (2x2) - 18 x 300     1 Hours 30 Minutes

                      G     (2x2) - 17 x 300     1 Hours 25 Minutes

                      B     (2x2) - 18 x 300     1 Hours 30 Minutes

                      Total Exp: - 7 Hours 35 Minutes

Calibration:     Bias, Flats

​Processing :    PixInsight 1.8 (1195)