Does the IC 342/Maffei Galaxy Group Really Exist?

Abstract

Based on the archival images of the Hubble Space Telescope we performed stellar photometry in the infrared and visible ranges in the fields of the Maffei 1, Maffei 2 and IC 342 galaxies, the light from which undergoes strong absorption by the interstellar gas and dust clouds of our Galaxy. The resulting Hertzsprung-Russell diagrams reveal red giant branches and the positions of their upper boundaries and color indices. A comparison of color indices of the red giant branch with similar indices in the galaxies not experiencing extinction made it possible to determine the amount of extinction in Maffei 1, Maffei 2 and IC 342 as follows: A_V = 3.06, 3.65 and 0.95, respectively. We found that these galaxies are located at the distances of 6.6, 6.8 and 3.9 Mpc. The values obtained substantially differ from the distances to these same galaxies (3.4, 3.5 and 3.5 Mpc), measured by Wu et al. in 2014 using the same images. The measurements we carried out show that Maffei 1 and Maffei 2 do not form a single group with the IC 342 galaxy, as previously thought.