4. Discussion

As it is seen from Table 1 (click here), among 260 galaxy candidates 132 are absent in the previous catalogues and lists. In other words, 51% of our list objects are new. All but one are visible on two different colour films and we suppose they are real objects. From them 33 galaxies have radial velocity data including 7 recent HI measurements made by Huchtmeier et al. (1997).

Obviously, there is no direct way to estimate the resulting efficiency of our searches. We did not meet in the literature a similar attempt just concerning the search for very nearby dwarf galaxies. Binggeli et al. (1990) were searching for dwarf galaxies on deep IIIa-J Palomar Schmidt telescope plates in several sky belts in the range of D.= [+28, +57], , ]. Among 179 objects considered by them to be dwarf galaxies there are only 2 objects in common with our list.

Schombert et al. (1992) published a catalogue of LSB galaxies found on the POSS-II survey in the declination zone D. = [0, +25]. Their catalogue contains 369 LSB galaxies with angular diameters greater than 0.5 arcmin. Basing on the results of the HI survey of the catalogue galaxies, Schombert et al. (1992) concluded that most of the detected objects are spirals with V > 2000 km/s. Only 4 dwarf galaxies have V₀ < 500 km/s.

Impey et al. (1996) carried out a search for LSB galaxies in the equatorial zone covering an area of 786 sq.degrees. Using a combination of both automated and visual examination of glass copies of the UKST IIIa-J survey plates they detected 516 low surface brightness objects with a > 0.5 arcmin. For 264 and 160 objects the optical and HI velocities, respectively, have been measured. Our analysis of their catalogue data showed the following:

1. Only two corrected radial velocities do not exceed the limit of 500 km/s. But in both cases the measurements refer to stars projected on the galaxies.
2. There are no common objects in the list of Impey et al. (1996) and our Table 1 (click here).
3. Many Impey et al. (1996) LSB objects of irregular shape on their finding charts, looking like nearby dwarf candidates (for example, 0123-0029, 0129-0024, 0217+0031, 0224+0238, 0224+0233, 0227+0040 etc.), are unrecognized absolutely on both (blue and red) films of POSS-II.

In carrying out the search, we found independently all three dwarf spheroidal companions of the M 31: And I, And II, And III which had been discovered by van den Bergh (1972). However, we did not find any new spheroidal nor did we find irregular candidate member of this group. In the zone of strong obscuration in the vicinity of spiral galaxies IC 342 and Maffei 2 we found independently the galaxies Cas 1, Cas 2, MB1 discovered recently by Huchtmeier et al. (1995), Kraan-Korteweg et al. (1994) and McCall & Buta (1995). Moreover we believe that our list contains probably additional members of this nearby galaxy complex.

It should be emphasized that Table 1 (click here) does not contain other nearby galaxies which have been presented in their basic list (Karachentsev 1994). This is the reason why LGS 3, GR 8, K 52, and some other well-known dwarf galaxies do not appear in Table 1 (click here).

To clarify the nature of galaxies from our list one needs to measure their radial velocities. The pilot HI survey of the sample of 26 objects from this list made by Huchtmeier et al. (1997) shows that about 70% of them are detected in the 21 cm line, and the fraction of very nearby dwarfs with V₀ < 500 km/s consists of 1/4.