NGC-5846 is a massive elliptical galaxy located in the eastern part of the constellation of Virgo, near the bright star 110 Virginis. It lies at a distance of 90 million light years from Earth and is 110,000 light years in diameter. At its center is a supermassive black hole with a mass of 1 billion suns. NGC-5846 was discovered by Sir William Herschel in 1788. Also visible in this image is companion galaxy NGC-5850, a classic example of a face-on barred spiral galaxy.
This image, acquired on July 14, 2012, is a 40 minute integration of 100 second exposures through the Celestron C-11 at f/2, using the HyperStar III imaging system and the Starlight Express SXVR-H694C color CCD camera, operating at -10 degrees below ambient temperature and binned 1 X 1. Guided, captured and combined using Maxim DL5 Pro. Post processed using PhotoShop CS2, Gradient XTerminator, StarShrink, Carboni's Astro Tools and NoiseWare.