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Chandra's unique ability to precisely locate and resolve individual X-ray sources in 12 globular clusters in our Galaxy has given astronomers a crucial clue as to the origin of these sources. Two clusters, known as NGC 6266 (or M62) and NGC 7099 (or M30), are shown here in this 2003 image.
A globular cluster is a spherical collection of hundreds of thousands and even millions of stars buzzing around each other in a gravitationally bound stellar beehive that is about a hundred light years in diameter. The stars in a globular cluster are often only about a tenth of a light year apart. For comparison, the nearest star to the Sun, Proxima Centauri, is 4.2 light years away.
Most of the point-like sources in these images are binary star systems containing a collapsed star, such as a neutron star or a white dwarf star, that is pulling matter off a normal companion star. While direct, head-on collisions between stars are rare even in these crowded circumstances, close encounters occur and can lead to the formation of binary star systems containing a collapsed star.
The images illustrate a general trend observed for globular clusters. Clusters such as M62 where the stars are packed very closely together and the rate of close encounters is high have more X-ray binaries than those such as M30 in which close encounters occur less often. This is strong evidence that the X-ray binaries in globular clusters are formed by close encounters.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/MIT/D.Pooley et al.
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #chandraxrayobservatory #ChandraXRay #cxo #chandra #astronomy #space #astrophysics #nasamarshallspaceflightcenter #solarsystemandbeyond #globularcluster
Messier 12 (M12 or NGC 6218 in the New General Catalog) is a globular cluster in the constellation Ophiuchus. It is also referred to as the “Gumball Globular”. It was discovered in 1764 by the French astronomer Charles Messier who described it as a “nebula without stars”. M12 is approximately 15,700 light-years distant. You will definitely need binoculars or a small telescope to see this cluster. This cluster contains about 200,000 stars, the brightest of them are about 12th magnitude.
Observation data (J2000 epoch)
Class: IX
Constellation: Ophiuchus
Right ascension: 16h 47m 14.18s
Declination: –01° 56′ 54.7″
Distance: 16.44 ± 0.16 kly
Apparent magnitude (V): 6.7
Apparent dimensions (V): 16′.0
Tech Specs: Meade 12” LX-90 SCT Telescope, Antares Focal Reducer, ZWO ASI2600MC camera running at 0F, 40 x 60 seconds, Celestron CGX-L pier mounted, ZWO EAF and ASIAir Pro, processed in DSS and PixInsight. Image Date: July 23, 2025. Location: The Dark Side Observatory (W59), Weatherly, PA, USA (Bortle Class 4).
This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image features the field of stars that is NGC 1786. The globular cluster is located in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), a small satellite galaxy of the Milky Way Galaxy that is approximately 160,000 light-years away from Earth. NGC 1786 itself is in the constellation Dorado. It was discovered in the year 1835 by Sir John Herschel.
The data for this image comes from an observing program that compares old globular clusters in nearby dwarf galaxies — the LMC, the Small Magellanic Cloud, and the Fornax dwarf spheroidal galaxy — to globular clusters in the Milky Way galaxy. Our galaxy contains over 150 of these old, spherical collections of tightly-bound stars, which astronomers have studied in depth — especially with Hubble images like this one, which show them in previously unattainable detail. Being very stable and long-lived, globular clusters act as galactic time capsules, preserving stars from the earliest stages of a galaxy’s formation.
Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, M. Monelli; Acknowledgment: M. H. Özsaraç
#NASAMarshall #NASA #NASAHubble #Hubble #NASAGoddard #GlobularCluster
Even during the full Moon as yesterday, M3 is a fantastic sight in a medium size telescope. It has an extraordinary presence!
Half a million stars are estimated in this globular cluster many of them are variable and are used to estimate its distance (33900 light years away)
45 exposures of 60s in LRGB (21 in L).
C11 + STL 11Km
Messier 5
Credit: Giuseppe Donatiello (Oria Amateur Astrophysical Observatory - OAAO)
2000 RA 15h 18m 33.22s Dec +02° 04′ 51.7″
M5 ( NGC 5904) is a globular cluster in Serpens. It was discovered by Gottfried Kirch in 1702.
M5 is just visible to the naked eye as a faint blurred star.
Spanning 165 light-years in diameter, M5 is one of the largest known globular clusters. It is 13 billion years old and also one of the eldest globular clusters in our Galaxy. Its distance is about 24,500 light-years, and it contains more than 100,000 stars.
(127ED@1140mm)
Messier 3 is a globular cluster of stars in the constellation Canes Venatici. It was the first Messier object to be discovered by Charles Messier himself. It is about 33,920 ly from earth, 11.4 billion years old, and approximately 180 ly in diameter. Also seen in the image (lower left) is the star HD 119081, a red giant with a diameter 11 times greater than our sun. The spiral galaxy NCG 5263 can be seen in the lower right of the image.
Rio Rancho NM Bortle 5/6 zone
April 6-7, 2022
William Optics Redcat 51
ZWO 183mc pro
ZWO 30mm f/4 mini guide scope and ZWO 120 Mini
Optolong L-Pro filter
ZWO ASI Air Pro
Sky-Watcher HEQ5
119 X 300s lights; with darks bias dithering
Gain 111 at -10C
Processed in DSS and PS
Globular cluster M14. When the moon is full and there are only a few hours of anything vaguely resembling darkness (and most of that time under clouds), options for targets are somewhat limited. But globular clusters are nice, bright objects that can be captured quickly, and there are still a few we haven't imaged yet. This one had so far evaded being imaged and now it's another Messier object I can tick off the list.
[From Wikipedia] Messier 14 (also known as M14 or NGC 6402) is a globular cluster of stars in the constellation Ophiuchus. It was discovered by Charles Messier in 1764.
At a distance of about 30,000 light-years, M14 contains several hundred thousand stars. At an apparent magnitude of +7.6 it can be easily observed with binoculars. Medium-sized telescopes will show some hint of the individual stars of which the brightest is of magnitude +14.
The total luminosity of M14 is in the order of 400,000 times that of the Sun corresponding to an absolute magnitude of -9.12. The shape of the cluster is decidedly elongated. M14 is about 100 light-years across.
15/07/2022
014 x 180-second exposures at Unity Gain (139) cooled to -10°C
015 x dark frames
015 x flat frames
100 x bias frames
Binning 1x1
Total integration time = 42 minutes
Captured with APT
Guided with PHD2
Processed in Nebulosity and Photoshop
Equipment:
Telescope: Sky-Watcher Explorer-150PDS
Mount: Skywatcher EQ5
Guide Scope: Orion 50mm Mini
Guiding Camera: Zwo ASI 120 MC and SVBONY SV105 with ZWO USBST4 guider adapter
Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI1600MC Pro with anti-dew heater
Baader Mark-III MPCC Coma Corrector
Filter: Light Pollution filter and Optolong L-Pro
On the night of 15th / 16th July 2022 comet C/2017 K2 (PANSTARRS) was at its closest conjunction with the globular cluster Messier 10 so I had to get out there and image it.
William Optics 70mm refractor and Canon 1100D on an EQ5 mount on a permanent pier. The mount was tracking at sidereal rate. M10 is in Ophiuchus and it drops behind trees from the pier quite early, so I had to start imaging while it was still twilight. I shot more frames than I stacked but tried to only stack the best.
90 x 30 seconds at ISO-1600 stacked with 15 darks using Deep Sky Stacker. I did several versions of the stack, but this version was the best. It is only stacked on the stars so the comet is slight smeared because it had moved a bit during this session.
Processing was done in Photoshop, Lightroom and Fast Stone Image Viewer.
Like Sherlock Holmes’s magnifying glass, the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope can peer into an astronomical mystery in search of clues. The enigma in question concerns the globular cluster Ruprecht 106, pictured here. Unlike most globular clusters, Ruprecht 106 may be what astronomers call a single population globular cluster. While the majority of stars in a globular cluster formed at approximately the same location and time, it turns out that almost all globular clusters contain at least two groups of stars with distinct chemical compositions. The newer stars will have a different chemical make-up that includes elements processed by their older, massive cluster companions. A tiny handful of globular clusters do not possess these multiple populations of stars, and Ruprecht 106 is a member of this enigmatic group.
Hubble captured this star-studded image using one of its most versatile instruments, the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS). Much like the stars in globular clusters, Hubble’s instruments also have distinct generations: ACS is a third-generation instrument which replaced the original Faint Object Camera in 2002. Some of Hubble’s other instruments have also gone through three iterations: The Wide Field Camera 3 replaced the Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2) during the last servicing mission to Hubble. WFPC2 itself replaced the original Wide Field and Planetary Camera, which was installed on Hubble prior to its launch.
Astronauts on the space shuttle serviced Hubble in orbit a total of five times and were able to either upgrade aging equipment or replace instruments with newer, more capable versions. This high-tech tinkering in low Earth orbit has helped keep Hubble at the cutting edge of astronomy for more than three decades.
Text credit: European Space Agency (ESA)
Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, A. Dotter
For more information: www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2022/hubble-investigat...
The scattered stars of the globular cluster NGC 6355 are strewn across this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. NGC 6355 is a galactic globular cluster that resides in our Milky Way galaxy's inner regions. It is less than 50,000 light-years from Earth in the constellation Ophiuchus.
Globular clusters are stable, tightly bound groups of tens of thousands to millions of stars that are associated with all types of galaxies. Their dense populations of stars and mutual gravitational attraction give these clusters a roughly spherical shape that holds a bright, central concentration of stars surrounded by an increasingly sparse sprinkling of stars. The dense, bright core of NGC 6355 shines in crystal-clear detail as Hubble is able to resolve individual stars in the crowded area toward the center of this image.
Hubble has revolutionized the study of globular clusters. It is almost impossible to distinguish individual stars in globular clusters with ground-based telescopes. Hubble’s unique capabilities and vantage point above Earth’s light-distorting atmosphere allow it to capture a globular cluster’s constituent stars in detail. This image contains data from Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys and Wide Field Camera 3.
Text credit: European Space Agency (ESA)
Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, E. Noyola, R. Cohen
For more information: www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2023/hubble-gazes-at-c...
MESSIER 8, NGC 6523, NGC 6530 - LAGOON NEBULA AND CLUSTER
The Lagoon Nebula, Messier 8 (NGC 6523) is one of the finest star-forming regions in the sky, and is faintly visible to the naked eye. It is a giant glowing cloud of interstellar gas, divided by a dark lane of dust, containing a cluster of young stars (NGC 6530) that have formed from it.
The brightest parts of the Lagoon Nebula contain a feature known as the "Hourglass Nebula", discovered and named by John Herschel. This is in a region where vivid star formation is taking place, and its bright emission is caused by heavy excitation from very hot, young stars.
The nebula also contains a number of dark globules which represent collapsing clouds of protostellar material. The most prominent of these dark patches were catalogued by E. E. Barnard: B 88, a comet-shaped globule extended North-to-South in the nebula's eastern half; B 89, a smaller dark nebula near the cluster NGC 6530; and B 296, a long, narrow black patch at the nebula's south edge.
Properties and Cluster
The Lagoon Nebula lies in the heart of the galaxy's Sagittarius-Carina spiral arm, but its distance is a bit uncertain. Estimates range from 4,800 to 6,500 light years, with 5,200 quoted by many sources. A 2006 study found a distance of 4,100 light years, which would make its true size about 110 x 50 light years. The nebula probably has a depth comparable to its linear dimensions. The dark "Bok" globules of collapsing protostellar material have diameters of about 10,000 AU.
Hubble Space Telescope image of the "hourglass" structure at the center of M 8.
The western half of M 8 is primarily illuminated by the magnitude 5.97 star 9 Sagittarii, an extremely hot O5 star which radiates 44 times more high-energy ultraviolet than visual light. At visual wavelengths, 9 Sagittarii is 23,000 times brighter than our Sun! The illuminator of the "Hourglass" feature is the hot star Herschel 36 (mag 9.5, spectral class O7). In 2006, four Herbig-Haro objects were detected within the Hourglass, providing the first direct evidence of active star formation by accretion within it.
The hot O-type stars of the young open cluster NGC 6530 are fluorescing the eastern part of the nebula. As their light shows little reddening by interstellar matter, this cluster is probably situated just in front of the Lagoon Nebula. Its brightest star is a hot, mag 6.9 class O5 star, with an age around 2 million years. The cluster also contains one extremely hot, peculiar star of spectral type Of, with spectral lines of ionized Helium and Nitrogen.
Text source : Livesky.com
Technical Details
Data acquisition: Martin PUGH
Processing: Nicolas ROLLAND
Location: Yass, New South Whales, Australia
RGB: 1 x 900sec
Optics: FSQ106 EDX3 @F/D 5.0
Mount: Paramount ME II
CCD: QHY600 OSC
Pre Processing: CCDstack & Pixinsight
Post Processing: Photoshop CC
Aberkenfig, South Wales
Lat +51.542 Long -3.593
Skywatcher 254mm Newtonian Reflector, Olympus E410 at prime focus. EQ6 Syntrek Mount.
23 frames used in stacking
14 x 50s at 800 ISO.
9 x 50s at 1600 ISO
Also 10 dark frames.
Imaging session commenced at 23:35 UT 14-04-2020.
Processed with Deep Sky Stacker and final levels adjusted with G.I.M.P.
The final image is slightly cropped but it displays coma towards the edges. This is one drawback of a parabolic f/4.8 Newtonian.
Messier 13, the Great Globular Cluster in Hercules, comprised of several hundred thousand stars. A senior citizen of the universe at 11.66 billion years of age. Located 22,180 ly from earth with a radius of 72.5 ly.
The galaxy visible in the lower left is NGC 6207, discovered by William Herschel on 16 May, 1787. It is located about 30 Mly from earth.
Rio Rancho NM Bortle 5/6 zone
April 14-15, 2022
William Optics Redcat 51
ZWO 183mc pro
ZWO 30mm f/4 mini guide scope and ZWO 120 Mini
Optolong L-Pro filter
ZWO ASI Air Pro
Sky-Watcher HEQ5
228 X 300s lights with darks, bias, dithering
Gain 111 at -10C
Processed in DSS and PS
This is a large stellar field designated as NGC 206, it is located in one of the spiral arms of the Andromeda Galaxy. Also marked in this view are a few globular clusters found in the same field of view. I used information from Robert Gendler Astrophotography (www.robgendlerastropics.com/) to help identify some of the globular clusters in my image.
Observation data (J2000 epoch)
Right ascension: 00h 40m 31.3s
Declination: +40° 44′ 21″
Apparent dimensions (V): 4.2′ (arcmin)
Constellation: Andromeda
Tech Specs: Orion 8” RC Telescope, ZWO ASI2600MC camera running at -10F, 135 Minutes using 60 second exposures, Celestron CGEM-DX pier mounted, ZWO EAF and ASIAir Pro, processed in PixInsight. Image Date: November 3 and 7, 2024. Location: The Dark Side Observatory (W59), Weatherly, PA, USA (Bortle Class 4).This is a large stellar field designated as NGC 206, it is located in one of the spiral arms of the Andromeda Galaxy. Also marked in this view are a few globular clusters found in the same field of view. I used information from Robert Gendler Astrophotography (www.robgendlerastropics.com/) to help identify some of the globular clusters in my image.
Observation data (J2000 epoch)
Right ascension: 00h 40m 31.3s
Declination: +40° 44′ 21″
Apparent dimensions (V): 4.2′ (arcmin)
Constellation: Andromeda
Tech Specs: Orion 8” RC Telescope, ZWO ASI2600MC camera running at -10F, 135 Minutes using 60 second exposures, Celestron CGEM-DX pier mounted, ZWO EAF and ASIAir Pro, processed in PixInsight. Image Date: November 3 and 7, 2024. Location: The Dark Side Observatory (W59), Weatherly, PA, USA (Bortle Class 4).
Globular Cluster Messier 62 (M62 or NGC 6266) is a cluster that can be found in the constellation of Ophiuchus. This cluster was photographed in July 16, 2015 nd the final image is a stack of 18 thirty second exposures at ISO 3200 using a Canon 6D at prime focus of a Celestron 6" telescope. The imaging system was mounted on an iOptron ZEQ25 equatorial mount. M62 lies at a distance of about 22,500 light-years. Software used to create this image include DeepSkyStacker (for stacking the individual frames), ImagePlus (for initial stretching and post processing), and Corel Paintshop Pro X5 for the final image adjustments.
Messier 13 or M13 (also designated NGC 6205 and sometimes called the Great Globular Cluster in Hercules, the Hercules Globular Cluster, or the Great Hercules Cluster), is a globular cluster of several hundred thousand stars in the constellation of Hercules. It is often described by astronomers as the most magnificent globular cluster visible to northern observers.
About 145 light-years in diameter, M13 is composed of several hundred thousand stars, with estimates varying from around 300,000 to over half a million. M13 is 22,200–25,000 light-years away from Earth, and the globular cluster is one of over one hundred that orbit the center of the Milky Way.
30/04/2024
025 x 180-second exposures at Unity Gain (139) cooled to -10°C
055 x dark frames
075 x flat frames
100 x bias/offset frames
Binning 1x1
Total integration time = 1 hour and 15 minutes
Captured with APT
Guided with PHD2
Processed in Nebulosity and Photoshop
Astrometry assistance from Astrometry.net
Equipment
Telescope: Sky-Watcher Explorer-150PDS
Mount: Skywatcher EQ5
Guide Scope: Orion 50mm Mini
Guiding Camera: ZWO ASI120MC
Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI1600MC Pro
Baader Mark-III MPCC Coma Corrector
Light pollution filter
Messier 19 (M19 or NGC 6273) is located in the constellation Ophiuchus. This most recent observation was made using a Canon 6D attached at prime focus to my Celestron C6-A SCT. I used 30-second exposures at ISO 3200, 9-minutes total time. I also included twenty 30-second dark frames in the stacked images, great for weeding out hot and cold pixels from your images. If you do nothing else, always take the time to create dark frames.
Additional details on my blog at: www.leisurelyscientist.com/?p=753
M13 the Hercules cluster with NGC6207 Galaxy photobombing.
Skywatcher 72ed
Celestron SE mount and homemade wedge
Canon 600d
90x 30 second exposures & calibration frames.
Stacked in DSS and processed in GIMP and Lightroom.
This Hubble Space Telescope image of M80 features observations in ultraviolet, visible, and infrared wavelengths of light. This data helped scientists learn more about the sequence of cosmic events that lead to the formation of various sub-populations of stars in globular clusters like this one.
Credit: NASA, ESA, and G. Piotto (Universita degli Studi di Padova); Image Processing: Gladys Kober
For more of Hubble's Messier Catalog, visit: www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/hubble-s-messier-catalog
Messier 92 (also known as M92 or NGC 6341) is a globular cluster of stars in the northern constellation of Hercules. It was discovered by Johann Elert Bode in 1777, then published in the Jahrbuch during 1779. The cluster was independently rediscovered by Charles Messier on March 18, 1781 and added as the 92nd entry in his catalogue. M92 is at a distance of about 26,700 light-years away from Earth.
Celestron C11 XLT - mirror block mod.
Canon / CentralDS EOS Astro 50D
Starizona SCT Corrector f/7.5
2x100" ISO1600 -7C
2x200" ISO1600 -7C
2x100" ISO800 -7C
Very happy to have observed and taken my first comet !
⇒ This is a unique 30 seconds exposure shot.
⇒ We can see clearly the comet's tail, just behind the green core. The large bright point at the top left corner is the globular cluster M79.
--> Reflector Telescope 200/800mm
Technical details on the photograph
The teeming stars of the globular cluster NGC 6544 glisten in this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. This cluster of tightly bound stars lies more than 8,000 light-years away from Earth and is, like all globular clusters, a densely populated region of tens of thousands of stars.
This image of NGC 6544 combines data from two of Hubble’s instruments, the Advanced Camera for Surveys and Wide Field Camera 3, as well as two separate astronomical observations. The first observation was designed to find a visible counterpart to the radio pulsar discovered in NGC 6544. A pulsar is the rapidly spinning remnant of a dead star, emitting twin beams of electromagnetic radiation like a vast astronomical lighthouse. This pulsar rotates particularly quickly, and astronomers turned to Hubble to help determine how this object evolved in NGC 6544.
The second observation which contributed data to this image was also designed to find the visible counterparts of objects detected at other electromagnetic wavelengths. Instead of matching up sources to a pulsar, however, astronomers used Hubble to search for the counterparts of faint X-ray sources. Their observations could help explain how clusters like NGC 6544 change over time.
Text credit: European Space Agency (ESA)
Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, W. Lewin, F. R. Ferraro
For more information: www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2023/hubble-glimpses-a...
July 16, 2015 offered a fantastic early evening of astrophotography with a darker than normal view of the southern horizon from my location in Weatherly, PA. I used this opportunity to image some globular clusters in the low southern skies that I typically do not have good enough skies to image.
The first globular that was imaged is Messier 4 (M4 or NGC 6121) located very close to the star Antares in the constellation Scorpius.
This most recent observation was made using a Canon 6D attached at prime focus to my Celestron C6-A SCT. At the time of this writing, available for $399 from High Point Scientific. I used 30-second exposures at ISO 3200, 9-minutes total time. Also included twenty 30-second dark frames in the stacked images.
Burnham states this about M4, “Fine globular star cluster, one of the largest objects of its type, and also one of the nearest. It is probably the easiest of all the bright globulars to locate; merely point the telescope to Antares, and then move 1.3 degrees directly west, and there you are.” (Burnham’s Celestial Handbook, Robert Burnham Jr., Volume III)
Aberkenfig, South Wales
Lat +51.542 Long -3.593
Skywatcher 254mm Newtonian Reflector, Olympus E410 at prime focus. EQ6 Syntrek Mount.
3 x 50s ISO 1600
12 x 50s ISO 800
10 x 40s ISO 800
Also 10 dark frames
Imaging session commenced at 02:17 UT
Processed with Deep Sky Stacker and final levels adjusted with G.I.M.P.
The final image is slightly cropped but it still displays some coma towards the edges. This is one drawback of a parabolic f/4.8 Newtonian.
Looking like a glittering swarm of buzzing bees, the stars of globular cluster NGC 6440 shine brightly in this Hubble Space Telescope image. The cluster is located some 28,000 light-years away in the constellation Sagittarius, the archer.
Globular clusters like NGC 6440 are roughly spherical, tightly packed, collections of stars that live on the outskirts of galaxies. They hold hundreds of thousands to millions of stars that average about one light-year apart, but they can be as close together as the size of our solar system.
The data used to create this image came from five different Hubble observing programs, four of which focused on the properties of pulsars. Pulsars are highly magnetized, rotating neutron stars emitting a beam of electromagnetic radiation from its magnetic poles. To us, that beam appears as a short burst or pulse as the star rotates. Pulsars spin extremely fast. Astronomers have clocked the fastest pulsars at more 716 rotations per second, but a pulsar could theoretically rotate as fast as 1,500 rotations per second before they slowly lose energy or break apart.
Credit: NASA, ESA, C. Pallanca and F. Ferraro (Universits Di Bologna), and M. van Kerkwijk (University of Toronto); Processing: G. Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America)
For Hubble’s Star Clusters page, visit: www.nasa.gov/content/discoveries-hubbles-star-clusters
M22 (NGC 6656) is a rich globular cluster that is visible in the dense star fields of Sagittarius. If you took pictures of it throughout the night, you could look for RR Lyrae variables to measure the distance to it. This is the method Harlow Shapley used -- based on Henrietta Leavitt's period-luminosity analysis -- to measure the size of the Milky Way Galaxy and our position within it. The bright star at the lower right is 24 Sgr.
From 16 90s exposures preprocessed in Nebulosity, stacked and initially processed in PixInsight, with final touches in PS CS 5.1. Taken with a Celestron Edge HD at f/2.3 with Hyperstar and an Atik 314L+ color CCD.
Image center (J2000) is at
RA 18h 35m 31s
DEC -23° 52' 32"
This glittering gathering of stars is Pismis 26, a globular star cluster located about 23,000 light-years away. Many thousands of stars gleam brightly against the black backdrop of the image, with some brighter red and blue stars located along the outskirts of the cluster. The Armenian astronomer Paris Pismis first discovered the cluster in 1959 at the Tonantzintla Observatory in Mexico, granting it the dual name Tonantzintla 2 (Ton2).
Pismis 26 is located in the constellation Scorpius near the galactic bulge, which is an area near the center of our galaxy that holds a dense, spheroidal grouping of stars that surrounds a black hole. Due to its location within the dust-heavy bulge, a process called “reddening” occurs, where dust scatters shorter wavelength blue light while longer wavelength red light passes through. Reddening distorts the apparent color of cosmic objects. Globular clusters are groups of stars held together by mutual gravitational attraction. They contain thousands of tightly packed stars and appear almost spherical in shape. Astronomers used the Hubble Space Telescope to study visible and infrared light from Pismis 26 to determine the cluster’s reddening, age, and metallicity.
The stars of Pismis 26 have high metallicity, meaning they contain a high fraction of elements heavier than hydrogen and helium, the most abundant elements in the universe. Specifically, the stars are rich in the element nitrogen, which is typical of stars in bulge clusters and has led scientists to believe that populations of differently-aged stars are present in the cluster. Pismis 26 has also likely lost a sizable portion of its mass over time due to a gravitational force called the strong inner galaxy tidal field, which the inner galaxy exerts on star clusters in the galactic bulge, causing their outer layers to pull away. Researchers estimate the age of the cluster to be 12 billion years old.
Credit: NASA, ESA and R. Cohen (Rutgers the State University of New Jersey); Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America)
For Hubble’s Star Clusters page, visit: www.nasa.gov/content/discoveries-hubbles-star-clusters
Globular Cluster Messier 14 Observation using a Canon 6D and 400mm lens. Full frame wide field shot.
This striking Hubble Space Telescope image shows the densely packed globular cluster known as NGC 2210, which is situated in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). The LMC lies about 157,000 light-years from Earth and is a so-called satellite galaxy of the Milky Way, meaning that the two galaxies are gravitationally bound. Globular clusters are very stable, tightly bound clusters of thousands or even millions of stars. Their stability means that they can last a long time, and therefore globular clusters are often studied to investigate potentially very old stellar populations.
In fact, 2017 research using some of the data that were also used to build this image revealed that a sample of LMC globular clusters were incredibly close in age to some of the oldest stellar clusters found in the Milky Way’s halo. They found that NGC 2210 specifically probably clocks in at around 11.6 billion years old. Even though this is only a couple of billion years younger than the universe itself, it made NGC 2210 by far the youngest globular cluster in their sample. All other LMC globular clusters studied in the same work were found to be even older, with four of them over 13 billion years old. This tells astronomers that the oldest globular clusters in the LMC formed contemporaneously with the oldest clusters in the Milky Way, even though the two galaxies formed independently.
Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, A. Sarajedini
#NASA #STScI #NASAGoddard #NASAMarshall #galaxy #HubbleSpaceTelescope #HST #globularcluster
M3 Globular Cluster imaged from London on the 4th April 2020 - 40 minutes luminance (120x20 seconds)
TS65 Quad Astrograph & ZWO ASI1600MM Pro camera
The globular cluster Terzan 2 in the constellation Scorpio is featured in this observation from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. Globular clusters are stable, tightly gravitationally bound clusters of tens of thousands to millions of stars found in a wide variety of galaxies. The intense gravitational attraction between the closely packed stars gives globular clusters a regular, spherical shape. As this image of Terzan 2 illustrates, the hearts of globular clusters are crowded with a multitude of glittering stars.
Hubble used both its Advanced Camera for Surveys and its Wide Field Camera 3 in this observation, taking advantage of the complementary capabilities of these instruments. Despite having only one primary mirror, Hubble’s design allows multiple instruments to inspect astronomical objects. Light from distant astronomical objects enters Hubble where the telescope's 8-foot primary mirror collects it. The primary directs that light to the secondary mirror that reflects the light into the depths of the telescope where smaller mirrors can direct the light into individual instruments.
Text credit: European Space Agency
Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, R. Cohen
For more information: www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2022/hubble-snaps-a-po...
NASA image release March 28, 2011
The high concentration of stars within globular clusters, like Messier 12, shown here in an image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, makes them beautiful photographic targets. But the cramped living quarters in these clusters also makes them home to exotic binary star systems where two stars are locked in tight orbits around each other and matter from one is gobbled up by its companion, releasing X-rays. It is thought that such X-ray binaries form from very close encounters between stars in crowded regions, such as globular clusters, and even though Messier 12 is fairly diffuse by globular cluster standards, such X-ray sources have been spotted there.
Astronomers have also discovered that Messier 12 is home to far fewer low-mass stars than was previously expected (eso0604). In a recent study, astronomers used the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope at Cerro Paranal, Chile, to measure the brightness and colours of more than 16 000 of the globular’s 200 000 stars. They speculate that nearly one million low-mass stars have been ripped away from Messier 12 as the globular has passed through the densest regions of the Milky Way during its orbit around the galactic centre.
It seems that the serenity of this view of Messier 12 is misleading and the object has had a violent and disturbed past.
Messier 12 lies about 23 000 light-years away in the constellation of Ophiuchus (The Serpent Bearer). This image was taken using the Wide Field Channel of Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys. The colour image was created from exposures through a blue filter (F435W, coloured blue), a red filter (F625W, coloured green) and a filter that passes near-infrared light (F814W coloured red). The total exposure times were 1360 s, 200 s and 364 s, respectively. The field of view is about 3.2 x 3.1 arcminutes.
Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA
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Messier 5 is generally regarded as being one of the best and brightest globular star clusters that is visible in the northern hemisphere of the sky. However, for some reason it seems to be under represented here on Flickr, possibly because it is surrounded by a rather uninteresting field (no background galaxies and no bright, color-contrasting stars).
It is interesting, however, that M5 seems to have a decidedly non-spherical shape. Not only are its stars distributed in a somewhat ragged outline but it appears that there is an elongation than runs from the bottom left toward the upper right in this image (approximating an oval with its major axis at a 45 degree angle).
This image was captured on the evening of June 7, 2015 from my red-zone, light-polluted driveway using a 5 inch aperture, f/5.2 telescope and a Sony NEX-5R digital camera (ISO 800, a stack of one hundred and twenty-three images each exposed for 30 seconds, producing a total exposure integration time of just over 61 minutes).
Image registration, integration, and adjustments done with PixInsight v01.08.03.1123 with final tweaks in Photoshop CC 2014.
This photo is best viewed at full size (1600 x 1200) or against a dark background (press the "L" key to enter the Flickr light box).
All rights reserved.
This image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope captures the sparkling globular cluster NGC 6569 in the constellation Sagittarius. Hubble explored the heart of this cluster with both its Wide Field Camera 3 and Advanced Camera for Surveys, revealing a glittering hoard of stars in this astronomical treasure trove.
Globular clusters are stable, tightly bound clusters containing tens of thousands to millions of stars and are associated with all types of galaxies. The intense gravitational attraction of these closely packed clusters of stars means that globular clusters have a regular spherical shape with a densely populated center, as seen at the heart of this star-studded image.
This observation comes from an investigation of globular clusters which lie close to the center of the Milky Way. Previous surveys avoided these objects, as the dusty center of our galaxy blocks their light and alters the colors of the stars residing in them. A star’s color is particularly important for astronomers studying stellar evolution, and can give astronomers insights into their ages, compositions, and temperatures.
The astronomers who proposed these observations combined data from Hubble with data from astronomical archives, allowing them to measure the ages of globular clusters including NGC 6569. Their research also provided insights into the structure and density of globular clusters towards the center of the Milky Way.
Text credit: European Space Agency (ESA)
Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, R. Cohen
For more information: www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2022/hubble-delves-int...
Nikon D5300 + Zenithstar 73
iOptron CEM26 + iPolar
SVBony CLSfilter
ZWO ASI224MC + WO Uniguide 120mm
40 x 3 min = exp 2h -- ISO 800
AstroM1
(r2.2)
This stellar swarm is M80 (NGC 6093), one of the densest of the 147 known globular star clusters in the Milky Way galaxy. Located about 28,000 light-years from Earth, M80 contains hundreds of thousands of stars, all held together by their mutual gravitational attraction. Globular clusters are particularly useful for studying stellar evolution, since all of the stars in the cluster have the same age (about 15 billion years), but cover a range of stellar masses. Every star visible in this image is either more highly evolved than, or in a few rare cases more massive than, our own Sun. Especially obvious are the bright red giants, which are stars similar to the Sun in mass that are nearing the ends of their lives.
Credit: The Hubble Heritage Team (AURA/STScI/NASA)
Image Number:PR99-26
Release Date: July 1, 1999
One single shot of 4mins at ISO 400. Tracking done with PHD2 (beta). Light Processing done in CS6,Image cropped by 33%. NGC5139 is 15,800 LY from earth. it is approx 12billion years old.
M71 è un controverso oggetto nella costellazione della Freccia: globulare o ammasso aperto?
Fino al 1970 è stato considerato un ammasso aperto particolarmente concentrato, per via della sua posizione sul piano della Via Lattea e per l’assenza di variabili a corto periodo tipiche degli ammassi globulari.
Altri indizi invece (come la sua elevata velocità radiale e il colore delle sue stelle più luminose) suggeriscono che potremmo trovarci di fronte ad un ammasso globulare poco concentrato, e difatti oggi sembra essere questa l’opinione prevalente degli astronomi.
M71 si trova ad una distanza di circa 12.000 anni luce dalla Terra ed ha un'estensione reale di soli 27 anni luce, molto pochi per un ammasso globulare.
Comunque sia, un oggetto caratteristico anche per via del ricco campo stellare su cui si proietta.
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M71 is a controversial object in the Sagitta constellation: globular or open cluster?
Until 1970 it was considered a particularly concentrated open cluster, due to its position on the plane of the Milky Way and the absence of short-period variables typical of globular clusters.
On the other hand, other clues (such as its high radial speed and the color of its brightest stars) suggest that we may be facing a poorly concentrated globular cluster, and in fact today this seems to be the prevailing opinion of astronomers.
M71 is located at a distance of about 12,000 light years from Earth and has a real extension of only 27 light years, very few for a globular cluster.
In any case, a characteristic object also due to the rich star field on which it is projected.
Technical data
RC12 GSO Truss (diameter 304mm, focal lenght 2432mm) GM2000HPSII mount
CCD Moravian G3-16200 with Astrodon LRGB filters
R 12x300" bin2 -20C
G 15x300" bin2 -20C
B 10x300" bin2 -20C
Total exposure 3h5'
Sw used: Voyager, Pixinsight 1.8, Photoshop CS5
Images taken from Promiod (Aosta Valley, Italy)
Scorpius has a number of globular clusters in the area between Antares and its "claws" - M 80 (NGC 6093) is pretty close to the center of that region.
Shot with LRGB filters from my backyard in Long Beach, CA.
L: 21 20 s exposures
R: 30 60 s exposures
G: 30 60 s exposures
B: 31 60 s exposures
All taken with an Atik 414-EX mono camera on a Celestron Edge HD 925 at a focal length of 1530 mm. LRGB filters are from Optolong.
Pre-processing in Nebulosity; registration, stacking, channel combination, and processing in PixInsight; final touches in Photoshop.
A stunning capture of the Messier 5 Globular Cluster I snapped last night (April, 12, 2015) at Frosty Drew Observatory in Charlestown, Rhode Island, USA. Messier 5 is found in the constellation Serpens and is 24,500 light years distant from Earth, is 165 light years in diameter and contains upwards of 500,000 gravitationally bound stars.
Photo Details:
Camera: Canon 60D MagicLantern
1370mm
f/9
ISO: 2500
Exposure: 90 seconds * 15
Median composite of 15 frames to reduce noise.
-Scott MacNeill
A globular cluster in Aquarius
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Image exposure: 35 minutes
Image size: 24 x 20 arcmin
Image date: 2022-07-29
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This 100 million-year-old globular cluster is located in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way and a birthplace for billions of stars. The cluster is approximately 160,000 light-years away in the constellation Dorado. Typical of globular clusters, it is a spherical collection of densely packed stars held together by mutual gravitational attraction. Unlike most globular clusters, however, the stars of NGC 1850 are relatively young. Globular clusters with young stars such as NGC 1850 are not present in our own Milky Way galaxy.
Astrophysicists theorize that when the first generation of stars in NGC 1850 was born, the stars ejected matter like dust and gas into the surrounding cosmos. The density of the newly formed star cluster was so high that this ejected matter could not escape the cluster’s gravitational pull, causing it to stay nearby. The intense gravity of the cluster also pulled in hydrogen and helium gas from its surroundings. These two sources of gas combined to form a second generation of stars, increasing the density and size of this globular cluster.
In 2021, scientists detected the presence of a black hole in NGC 1850. They have also detected many brighter blue stars (seen on the right) that burn hotter and die younger than red stars. Also present are around 200 red giants, stars that have run out of hydrogen in their centers and are fusing hydrogen further from their core, causing the outer layers to expand, cool, and glow red (visible throughout this image). Surrounding the cluster is a pattern of nebulosity, diffuse dust and gas theorized to come from supernova blasts (the red veil-like structures).
NGC 1850 is approximately 63,000 times the mass of the Sun, and its core is roughly 20 light-years in diameter. Astronomers used Hubble Space Telescope observations at a wide range of wavelengths to image this large star cluster and learn more about star formation.
Credit: NASA, ESA and N. Bastian (Donostia International Physics Center); Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America)
Hubble studied this star cluster using different filters to examine particular wavelengths of light. This image covers a broad range from the near-ultraviolet to the beginnings of the infrared spectrum. Ultraviolet observations are ideal for detecting the light from the hottest and youngest stars, as seen in this luminous, starry view. For a second image and more info, visit:
www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2022/hubble-captures-d...
For an older Hubble image of NGC 1850, visit: hubblesite.org/contents/news-releases/2001/news-2001-25.html
For Hubble’s Star Clusters page, visit: www.nasa.gov/content/discoveries-hubbles-star-clusters
Even the great observer Charles Messier had trouble seeing this globular cluster when building his Catalog of Nebulae and Star Clusters. It was originally spotted in 1752 by a French astronomer in what is now South Africa, but it took until 1778 for Messier to catalog it.
This is because, while Messier 55 is large and reasonably bright, it is lacking a dense core and many of its stars are quite faint, making it hard to observe in non-optimal conditions.
For northern observers M55 sits low in the sky, so the view is hampered by a thicker layer of atmosphere, as well as water vapor and light pollution. This hindered Messier’s view from his Paris observatory. When he cataloged it, Messier noted that “its light is even and does not appear to contain any star.”
Though this image shows just a portion of M55, the cluster as a whole appears spherical because the stars’ intense gravitational attraction pulls them together. Hubble’s clear view above Earth’s atmosphere resolves individual stars in this cluster. Ground-based telescopes can also resolve individual stars in M55, but fewer stars are visible.
Even in skies with low light pollution, viewed through binoculars, the cluster will only appear as a round hazy patch. Small telescopes can begin to resolve individual stars in M55, while larger aperture telescopes will pick out low magnitude stars easily. The star cluster is found in the southern part of the constellation Sagittarius and is easiest to spot in August.
The globular cluster is about 20,000 light-years away and has a diameter of about 100 light-years. It contains an estimated 100,000 stars with 55 variable stars whose brightness changes.
Credit: NASA, ESA, A. Sarajedini (Florida Atlantic University), and M. Libralato (STScI, ESA, JWST); Image Processing: Gladys Kober
For more of Hubble's Messier Catalog, visit: www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/hubble-s-messier-catalog
This striking image shows the densely packed globular cluster known as NGC 2210, which is situated in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). The LMC lies about 157 000 light-years from Earth, and is a so-called satellite galaxy of the Milky Way, meaning that the two galaxies are gravitationally bound. Globular clusters are very stable, tightly bound clusters of thousands or even millions of stars. Their stability means that they can last a long time, and therefore globular clusters are often studied in order to investigate potentially very old stellar populations.
In fact, 2017 research that made use of some of the data that were also used to build this image revealed that a sample of LMC globular clusters were incredibly close in age to some of the oldest stellar clusters found in the Milky Way’s halo. They found that NGC 2210 specifically probably clocks in at around 11.6 billion years of age. Even though this is only a couple of billion years younger than the Universe itself, it made NGC 2210 by far the youngest globular cluster in their sample. All other LMC globular clusters studied in the same work were found to be even older, with four of them over 13 billion years old. This is interesting, because it tells astronomers that the oldest globular clusters in the LMC formed contemporaneously with the oldest clusters in the Milky Way, even though the two galaxies formed independently.
As well as being a source of interesting research, this old-but-relatively-young cluster is also extremely beautiful, with its highly concentrated population of stars. The night sky would look very different from the perspective of an inhabitant of a planet orbiting one of the stars in a globular cluster’s centre: the sky would appear to be stuffed full of stars, in a stellar environment that is thousands of times more crowded than our own.
Credits: ESA/Hubble & NASA, A. Sarajedini, F. Niederhofer; CC BY 4.0
One of my fist short exposure learning/test Astro-images (photographed close to the city).
A deep sky wide field astro-photo of Omega Centauri (NGC 5139), a globular cluster in the constellation of Centaurus. Located at a distance of 15,800 light-years, it is the largest globular cluster in the Milky Way Galaxy (at a diameter of roughly 150 light-years).
To give an indication of distance, light travels about 10 trillion kilometers or 6 trillion miles in a year. The Omega Centauri globular cluster is estimated to contain approximately 10 million stars and a total mass equivalent to 4 million solar masses (1 solar mass is equal to the mass of the Sun, weighing in at about 2 Nonillion kilograms).
Globular Clusters were described by Carl Sagan like a "swarm of bees". In this case it is 10 Million suns in a dense cluster.
Photographed rather close to the "light polluted" suburbs of the West Rand and North Rand of Johannesburg (Gauteng Province, South Africa). Light Pollution Map.
Astrometry info:
RA, Dec center: 201.667367509, -47.469712706 degrees
Orientation: 1.04623985658 deg E of N
Pixel scale: 6.1860599014 arcsec/pixel
Field contains: NGC 5139
nova.astrometry.net/user_images/774840#annotated
Gear:
GSO 6" f/4 Imaging Newtonian Telescope (Astrograph).
Celestron Advanced VX Equatorial Mount.
Orion UltraBlock Narrowband Light Pollution Filter.
Canon 60Da DSLR (sensitive to IR light at 656.28 nm).
Processed in PixInsight.
Polar Aligned, but Unguided.
Stacked 10 sec. exposures (Lights/Subs).
Calibration Frames: Darks and Bias frames (no Flats).
Martin
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This image taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope shows Terzan 1, a globular cluster that lies about 22,000 light-years from Earth in the constellation Scorpius. It is one of 11 globular clusters that were discovered by the Turkish-Armenian astronomer Agop Terzan between 1966 and 1971 when he was working in France, based mostly at Lyon Observatory.
Terzan 1 is not a new target for Hubble. An image of the cluster was released back in 2015, taken by Hubble’s Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2). That instrument was replaced by the Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) during the 2009 Hubble servicing mission. WFC3 has both superior resolving power and a wider field of view than WFPC2, and the improvement is obvious in this fantastically detailed image.
Text credit: European Space Agency (ESA)
Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, R. Cohen
For more information: www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2022/hubble-eyes-a-bri...
This Hubble Space Telescope image of M14 includes observations taken in ultraviolet, visible, and near-infrared wavelengths of light. Astronomers used this data to better understand the formation and chemical makeup of different populations of stars that reside within this cluster.
Credit: NASA, ESA, and F. D'Antona (INAF, Osservatorio Astronomico di Roma); Image Processing: Gladys Kober
For more of Hubble's Messier Catalog, visit: www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/hubble-s-messier-catalog
The teeming stars of the globular cluster NGC 6544 glisten in this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. This cluster of tightly bound stars lies more than 8,000 light-years away from Earth and is, like all globular clusters, a densely populated region of tens of thousands of stars.
This image of NGC 6544 combines data from two of Hubble’s instruments, the Advanced Camera for Surveys and Wide Field Camera 3, as well as two separate astronomical observations. The first observation was designed to find a visible counterpart to the radio pulsar discovered in NGC 6544. A pulsar is the rapidly spinning remnant of a dead star, emitting twin beams of electromagnetic radiation like a vast astronomical lighthouse. This pulsar rotates particularly quickly, and astronomers turned to Hubble to help determine how this object evolved in NGC 6544.
The second observation which contributed data to this image was also designed to find the visible counterparts of objects detected at other electromagnetic wavelengths. Instead of matching up sources to a pulsar, however, astronomers used Hubble to search for the counterparts of faint X-ray sources. Their observations could help explain how clusters like NGC 6544 change over time.
Image Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, W. Lewin, F. R. Ferrar
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