M 64 has been known for a couple of centuries as "The Black Eye"
galaxy. The most striking feature is the lane of dark, obscuring
material that stretches across the face of this galaxy. Recent studies
have revealed another strange feature of M 64: the inner portion of
the galaxy rotates in the opposite direction of the outer portions! This
strange rotational mix, plus the dark lane, probably are the result of
a smaller companion galaxy which has been drawn into M 64, but has not
been completely absorbed yet. M 64 is 19 million light years from earth,
and 51,000 light years across.

Image data:
Camera: DSI-Color and DSI-Pro
Exposure: Lum = DSI-Pro, 42 seconds x 30
RGB = DSI-Color, 60 seconds x 16
Telescope: 10" Schmidt-Newtonian