NGC 997

NGC 997 is an interacting galaxy in the constellation of Cetus. The galaxy was discovered by Albert Marth on 10 November 1863. It has a regularly rotating central molecular gas disk, containing a black hole of between 4 x 107 and 1.8 x 109 solar masses. Its speed relative to the cosmological background is 6,270 ± 45 km/s, corresponding to a Hubble distance of 92.5 ± 6.5 Mpc (~302 million ly).

NGC 997 is accompanied by PGC 200205 also designated as NGC 997 NED01, a compact galaxy. No data is available for the latter galaxy. So, this pair may be due to an optical alignment, or they may be two gravitationally interacting galaxies about to merge.