Messier 105
Messier 105 or M105, also known as NGC 3379, is an elliptical galaxy located 36.6 million light years away in the equatorial constellation of Leo. It was discovered by Pierre Méchain on 24 March 1781, just a few days after he discovered the nearby galaxies Messier 95 and Messier 96. This galaxy is one of several that were not originally included in the original Messier Catalogue compiled by Charles Messier. Messier 105 was included in the catalog only when Helen S. Hogg found a letter by Méchain describing Messier 105 and when the object described by Méchain was identified as a galaxy previously named NGC 3379.
This galaxy has a morphological classification of E1, indicating a standard elliptical galaxy with a flattening of 10%. The major axis is aligned along a position angle of 71°. Isophotes of the galaxy are near perfect ellipses, twisting no more than 5° out of alignment, with changes in ellipticity of no more than 0.06. There is no fine structure apparent in the isophotes, such as ripples. Observation of giant stars in the halo indicate there are two general populations: a dominant metal-rich subpopulation and a weaker metal-poor group.
Messier 105 is known to have a supermassive black hole at its core whose mass is estimated to be between and. The galaxy has a weak active galactic nucleus of the LINER type with a spectral class of L2/T2, meaning no broad Hα line and intermediate emission line ratios between a LINER and a H II region. The galaxy also contains a few young stars and stellar clusters, suggesting some elliptical galaxies still form new stars, but very slowly.
This galaxy, along with its companion the barred lenticular galaxy NGC 3384, is surrounded by an enormous ring of neutral hydrogen with a radius of and a mass of where star formation has been detected. Messier 105 is one of several galaxies within the M96 Group, a group of galaxies in the constellation Leo. The group also includes the Messier objects M95 and M96.
