Virgo's Supercluster of Wonders

In mid-spring, Virgo the Maiden and Leo the Lion are high in the sky shortly after sunset. Humanity is getting its best look at the neighboring galaxy groups in the Virgo Supercluster and deep space observation of galaxies is at its peek.

Needle Galaxy (NGC 4565) in Coma Berenices as seen through a Unistellar eVscope (Credit: Stargazing Joshua Tree)

The Milky Way Galaxy is host to nearly 300 billion stars, one of them being our Sun. The Milky Way, and its nearest neighbors like the Andromeda Galaxy, are part of a small cluster of around 70 galaxies called the Local Group. The Local Group is, in turn, part of a clustering of galaxy groups called the Virgo Supercluster. The Virgo Supercluster contains 100 different galaxy groups that all together boast a collection of nearly 50,000 galaxies.

The Local Group, and therefore the Milky Way, exist on the outskirts of this100 million light year diameter Virgo Supercluster. That means, when we look out into the Universe, we find a high concentration of the Virgo Supercluster's galaxies in one direction. True to its name, this area of space is located in the direction of the Virgo constellation.

Looking towards Virgo the Maiden and the center of the Virgo Supercluster of galaxies (Credit: SkySafari)

One of the best galaxies for observation in this area is Messier 104 (M104). It is shaped like a frisbee, and tilted on its side, with a bright bulging core produced by the high concentration of stars at its center. Its orientation reminds onlookers of the famous wide-brimmed Mexican sombrero, the namesake of this Sombrero Galaxy.

M104 is 30 million light years away from the Milky Way and slightly larger, around 100,000 light years in diameter. Its bright center makes it one of the brighter nearby galaxies for Earth observation, and its orientation allows the bright core to silhouette the outer dust plane stretched in Earth's direction, a characteristic part of the Sombrero Galaxy.

The Sombrero galaxy (M104) through a Unistellar eVscope (Credit: Stargazing Joshua Tree)

A Mexican Sombrero hat (Credit: Wikipedia)

You'll find more of the Virgo Supercluster slightly west of the constellation Virgo in Leo the Lion, dense with galaxies like the famous Leo Triplet, three galaxies together in space. They belong to a group of around 20 galaxies called the Leo I Group, 35 million light years away from our Local Group in the Virgo Supercluster.

Another galaxy within the Leo I Group is M95, a small but bright barred spiral galaxy. Barred spiral galaxies have a straight line of material (bar) across the center of the core where the spiral arms protrude from. It is believed our own Milky Way is a barred spiral galaxy as well with a very similar classification to M95, both SBb galaxies. The 'SB' indicates that it is a barred sprial galaxy, and the 'b' indicates that the galaxy's arms are midway between tightly and loosely wound around the center. With no current way to travel outside our galaxy for a selfie, we cannot see the shape of the Milky Way as a whole. Peering at M95 is reminiscent to what the Milky Way may look like from afar; the way lifeforms in other galaxies may be viewing us right now.

Hubble Tuning Fork Diagram, showing the classification of galaxies from ellipticals on the left, sprials on top, and barred spirals on the bottom (Credit: Wikipedia)

Artist interpretation of the Milky Way Galaxy (Credit: European Southern Observatory)

M95 through the Very Large Telescope in Chile (Credit: European Southern Observatory)

Another interestingly defined galaxy in the Virgo Supercluster is M64, 17 million light years away from the Milky Way in the direction of the Coma Berenices constellation, nearby Virgo and Leo. A secondary disk of material is silhouetted over part of the galaxy's bright core. This obstruction offers an incredible view from Earth, and gives way to the common name, Black Eye Galaxy.

The Black Eye Galaxy (M64) through a Unistellar eVscope (Credit: Stargazing Joshua Tree)

There are no shortages of deep space galaxies to view in the Spring. The Virgo Supercluster of 50,000 galaxies is just one of nearly 10 million superclusters in the known Universe. Hold your thumb up the the sky and you'll cover nearly 10 million individual galaxies. The Universe is big and full of wonder.

Whether you have the ability to view these Spring deep space wonders through a telescope or observing with just your eyes, its a great time to be looking up!