Markarian's Chain

Markarian's Chain is a stretch of galaxies that forms part of the Virgo Cluster. When viewed from Earth, the galaxies lie along a smoothly curved line. Charles Messier first discovered two of the galaxies, M84 and M86, in 1781. The other galaxies seen in the chain were discovered by William Herschel[1] and are now known primarily by their catalog numbers in John Louis Emil Dreyer's New General Catalogue, published in 1888.[2] It was ultimately named after the Armenian astrophysicist, Benjamin Markarian, who discovered their common motion in the early 1960s.[3] Member galaxies include M84 (NGC 4374), M86 (NGC 4406), NGC 4477, NGC 4473, NGC 4461, NGC 4458, NGC 4438 and NGC 4435. {1}

Location: Kissimmee Prairie State Preserve

Scope: Stellarvue 130

Camera: Fli ML8300 with CFW2-7 and Astrodon Filters

600 sec LRGB binned 1

Sequence Generator Pro - Integration

Combined and processed in Pixinsight

Taken 4/29/19