It is designated peculiar (pec) due to patches of dust and young blue stars near its center.

Tidal interactions with M31 may have stripped away a significant fraction of the expelled gas and dust, leaving the galaxy as a whole, as it presents, deficient in its IM density.

The latter, designated EQ J004015.8+414420, had also been captured in images taken by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) that October.

[17] About half of the Andromeda's satellite galaxies are orbiting it along a highly flattened plane, with 14 out of 16 following the same sense of rotation.

One theory proposes that these 16 once belonged to a subhalo surrounding M110, then the group was broken up by tidal forces during a close encounter with Andromeda.