- Maffei I and II
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Two galaxies relatively close to the Milky Way Galaxy, first detected in the late 1960s by the Italian astronomer Paolo Maffei.Maffei I is a large elliptical galaxy, while Maffei II is a spiral galaxy. Though they are large and nearby, they are hidden in the Milky Way's zone of avoidance. At a distance of about 10 million light-years, they appear to be major members of one of the nearest galaxy groups outside the Local Group.
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two galaxies relatively close to the Milky Way Galaxy but unobserved until the late 1960s, when the Italian astronomer Paolo Maffei detected them by their infrared radiation. Studies in the United States established that the objects are galaxies. Lying near the border between the constellations Perseus and Cassiopeia, they are close to the plane of the Milky Way, where obscuring dust clouds in interstellar space prevent nearly all visible light emitted by external galaxies from reaching Earth.Maffei I is a large elliptical galaxy. At about 3,000,000 light-years' distance, it is close enough to belong to what is called the Local Group of galaxies, of which the Milky Way Galaxy is a member. Maffei II has a spiral structure and is about three times farther away than Maffei I.* * *
Universalium. 2010.
