I revisited GB 1 (Integral Sign Galaxy) Last night I wanted to see the H II knot on the end of the galaxy that Paul was talking about in his post. The transparency was not the best and seeing was so so not bad but not the best ether. I picked up GB 1 at once with direct vision at 375x with my finder eyepiece. I then bumped up the power to 488X and the H II knot was popping in and out. I then went to 610X and the knot was there direct vision and in moments of good seeing like Paul said the knot looked like a stellar point. The galaxy looked very dim and mottled and had a speckled appearance in monuments of the best seeing at this power. I also noted a brightening in the galaxy just to the East of the center of the galaxy (see image below) The brightening looked like a small bar to my eye and was just a little brighter than the rest of the galaxy. After looking at the paper (ApJ, 171, 13 by Richer, Sharpless and Olson) that Steve posted I see that I was seeing another H II star forming region in this most peculiar galaxy. I did not see the striped dwarf galaxy core on the South east end but I did not spend much time on it.
G B 1 inverted.JPG