New Laser Vision Helps Telescope Probe Distant Star Cluster [View all]

[Judi Lynn]

New Laser Vision Helps Telescope Probe Distant Star Cluster
by Katia Moskvitch
Date: 14 May 2013 Time: 05:40 PM ET


A powerful new ultraviolet laser that fires into the night sky is helping scientists take their most detailed look yet at a distant star cluster.

A team of astronomers at the Southern Observatory for Astrophysical Research (SOAR) and the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO) in Cerro Pachon in Chile used an instrument called SOAR Adaptive Module, or simply SAM, to peer deep inside the crowded NGC 6496 cluster to understand how its stars evolved.

The researchers measured the color and brightness of over 7,000 stars in NGC 6496, and determined that the star cluster is 10.5 billion years old and 32,600 light years away from Earth — the most exact measurement yet of the star cluster's key parameters. [Starry Night: Take Our Star Quiz]

The study also suggests that NGC 6496’s stars have a much higher proportion of elements heavier than hydrogen and helium than most clusters of its kind. The research will be detailed in an upcoming edition of the Astronomical Journal.

Star clusters across the universe come in two types: globular clusters, which are home to hundreds of thousands of gravitationally bound and very ancient stars, many of them nearly 10 billion years old; and open star clusters, which are normally very young and contain only a few hundred stars.

More:
http://www.space.com/21148-laser-telescope-tech-star-cluster.html