M6 - Open Cluster in Scopius

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ukastronomy

Posted: Sat Apr 19, 2008 12:21 am

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The Messier Ten Minute Challenge

M6 - Open Cluster in Scopius

The open cluster M6 (NGC 6405) is also known as the Butterfly Cluster.
At a distance of about 1,600 light-years the diameter of the cluster
is 12 light-years. The age of the cluster is said to be between 95 and
100 million years.

http://www.martin-nicholson.info/tenminutechallenge/m6.htm

Martin Nicholson, Daventry, England.

My website is at http://www.martin-nicholson.info/1/1a.htm
My informal Astronomical Blog is at http://ukastronomy.livejournal.com/

Yousuf Khan

Posted: Sun Apr 20, 2008 7:28 pm

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ukastronomy wrote:

Quote:

It doesn't look like much, almost like just a bunch of regularly
scattered stars, except that they are closer together than regularly
scattered stars.

Are stars in an open cluster supposed to be gravitationally bound to
each other? Do they come from the same region of space? Would planets
form around each one, or would their gravity make that impossible?

Yousuf Khan

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