Photo Agency - Astronomy - Space - Nature

> The Pleiades open cluster seen in infrared

The Pleiades open cluster seen in infrared

author: Nasa/JPL-Caltech/Novapix

reference: a-aou90-00200

Image Size 300 DPI: 19 * 19 cm

The Pleiades (M45), located more than 400 light-years away in the Taurus constellation, is a star cluster born when dinosaurs still roamed the Earth, about 100 million years ago. It is significantly younger than our 5-billion-year-old sun. The brightest members of the cluster, also the highest-mass stars, are known in Greek mythology as two parents, Atlas and Pleione, and their seven daughters, Alcyone, Electra, Maia, Merope, Taygeta, Celaeno and Asterope. There are thousands of additional lower-mass members, including many stars like our sun. Some scientists believe that our sun grew up in a crowded region like the Pleiades, before migrating to its present, more isolated home. The infrared image from Spitzer highlights the filaments, colored yellow, green and red in this view, made up of dust associated with the cloud through which the cluster is traveling. The densest portion of the cloud appears in yellow and red, and the more diffuse outskirts are shown in green hues. One of the parent stars, Atlas, can be seen at the bottom left, while six of the sisters are visible at top. Additional stars in the cluster are sprinkled throughout the picture in blue.

Keywords for this photo:

2004 - 2007 - ASTRONOMY - BROWN DWARF - INFRARED - M45 - OPEN CLUSTER - PLEIADES - SPITZER SPACE TELESCOPE - STAR - STAR CLUSTER - TAURUS -