YET ANOTHER SUB-COMPONENT INSIDE A BULGE - THE STRUCTURE OF THE PECULIAR SO GALAXY NGC-3384

This new investigation of the structure of NGC 3384 - the multi-compon ent lenticular galaxy member of the Leo Triplet - is based on CCD fram es in the BVR bands, on deep Schmidt plates and on long slit spectra. Besides the already known elongated component along the photometric mi nor axis, the application of an adaptive filter to a NTT CCD image of the galaxy, and the behaviour of the color light profiles, have reveal ed the existence of a small (tau similar to 6 '' similar or equal to 3 00 pc) central component aligned to the disk major axis. The shape of the stellar rotation curves and of the velocity dispersion profiles se em also due to the presence of such inner component, which can be a sm all disk or a secondary bar. After removal of the contamination by the nearby galaxy NGC 3379, the light distribution of NGC 3384 shows a re sidual asymmetry (similar to 0.1 mag) in the intermediate and outer re gions which cannot be attributed to diffuse dust and implies a cion ax isymmetric distribution of the stars in the disk. The observed asymmet ries can be interpreted as a relic of the Spitzer-Baade event which to ok place about 5 x 10(8) yr ago between NGC 3384 and NGC 3368, and whi ch is invoked to explain the large intergalactic HI cloud observed in the Leo region.