Markarian's Chain is a stretch of galaxies that forms part of the Virgo Cluster.
It is called a chain because, when viewed from Earth, the galaxies lie along a smoothly curved line.
It was named after the Armenian astrophysicist, B. E. Markarian, who discovered their common motion in the early 1960s.
Member galaxies include M84 (NGC 4374), M86 (NGC 4406), NGC 4477, NGC 4473, NGC 4461, NGC 4458.(WIKI)
The Eyes Galaxies seen in the middle of the frame (NGC 4435-NGC 4438, also known as Arp 120) are a pair of galaxies about 52 million light-years away.
Many of the small stars and speckles in the image are actually galaxies!
Imaged with the 16" f3.75 Dream Astrograph.
Apogee Alta U-16M camera.
LRGB image
L for 90 min (BIN 1)
RGB 10 minutes per channel Bin 2x2
(Total of 2 hrs )
Imaged from Tivoli farm in Namibia May 2015.