Discovered by Pierre Méchain in 1781.
M106 is approximately 25 million light years from the Earth and is located in the constellation Canes Venatici and very close to the better known constellation of Ursa Major. M106 is intermediate between a "barred" spiral and a "normal" spiral galaxy which gives it a very eye-catching appearance. It is a very active galaxy and shines extremely bright in the radio as well as the high energy portion of the spectrum and is thus classified a "Seyfert" galaxy. It is speculated that a super massive black hole lies at its center and is the source of the high-energy radiation coming from this very interesting celestial object.
1http://www.seds.org/messier/m/m106.html