Astronomical Observatory: Cool Images

Astr111 Photography Projects, Spring 2007

Subaru, Joseph Na

This picture that you see above is called Subaru or Pleiades. Its technical name is M45 and has a nick name of the "Seven Sisters." the Seven Sisters is categorized as an open cluster, which is a group of stars,100's-1000s, gathered closely together. This is different from globular clusters,10,000-million, which is a very large group of stars that are close together. The distance of Subaru to the earth is 400 light years. Interestingly enough it is one of the closest and most visible to the naked eye open cluster. This image is one piece of the cluster chosen for its bright reflection nebula.

Subaru is a young open cluster. One way you can tell that Subaru is young is by the cloud of dust and gas reflecting the blue light. If this were an older star cluster there would not be the cloud of dust and gas reflecting the blue light. the Subaru formation is famous throughout history, and is mentioned in many famous documents such as Homer's The Illiad and the Bible. The linear distance of my object is 0.31 light years.

References:
Fraknoi, Andrew ; Morrision, David ; Wolff, Sidney. Voyages: to the Stars and Galaxies (Third Edition). Thomson Books. 2004

Wikipedia.com

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pleiades_(star_cluster)