globular cluster
Noun
Meaning
globular cluster (plural globular clusters)
(astronomy) a densely-packed spherical star cluster containing thousands to millions of stars
Synonyms
Examples
47 Tucanae – the second most luminous globular cluster in the Milky Way, after Omega Centauri Core-collapse is thought to occur when the more massive stars in a globular cluster encounter their less massive companions.
At a distance of about 185,000 light-years, the globular cluster NGC 7006 is extremely remote.
As all the stars of a globular cluster are at approximately the same distance from us, their absolute magnitudes differ from their visual magnitude by about the same amount.
Messier 80 (NGC 6093) is a globular cluster of magnitude 7.3, 33,000 light-years from Earth.
He coined the term "globular cluster" in his Catalogue of a Second Thousand New Nebulae and Clusters of Stars published in 1789. citation The number of globular clusters discovered continued to increase, reaching 83 in 1915, 93 in 1930 and 97 by 1947.
In 1879, American astronomer Benjamin Gould designated a star Xi Tucanae—this had not been given a designation by Lacaille who had recognized it as nebulous, and it is now known as the globular cluster 47 Tucanae.