Palomar 5 is a

globular cluster A globular cluster is a spheroidal conglomeration of stars. Globular clusters are bound together by gravity, with a higher concentration of stars towards their centers. They can contain anywhere from tens of thousands to many millions of membe ...

and a member of the Palomar Globular Clusters group. It was discovered by

Walter Baade Wilhelm Heinrich Walter Baade (March 24, 1893 – June 25, 1960) was a German astronomer who worked in the United States from 1931 to 1959. Biography The son of a teacher, Baade finished school in 1912. He then studied maths, physics and astr ...

in 1950, and independently found again by

Albert George Wilson Albert George Wilson (July 28, 1918 – August 27, 2012) was an American astronomer and a discoverer of minor planets. He was born in Houston, Texas. He received his Ph.D. in mathematics from Caltech in 1947; his thesis title was ''Axiall ...

in 1955. After the initial name of Serpens, it was subsequently catalogued as Palomar 5. There is a process of disruption acting on this cluster because of the gravitation of the

Milky Way The Milky Way is the galaxy that includes our Solar System, with the name describing the galaxy's appearance from Earth: a hazy band of light seen in the night sky formed from stars that cannot be individually distinguished by the naked eye. ...

– in fact there are many stars leaving this cluster in the form of a

stellar stream In astronomy, stellar kinematics is the observational study or measurement of the kinematics or motions of stars through space. Stellar kinematics encompasses the measurement of stellar velocities in the Milky Way and its satellites as well as t ...

. The stream has a mass of 5000 solar masses and is 30,000 light years long. The cluster is currently from the

Galactic Center The Galactic Center or Galactic Centre is the rotational center, the barycenter, of the Milky Way galaxy. Its central massive object is a supermassive black hole of about 4 million solar masses, which is called Sagittarius A*, a compact ra ...

. It shows a noticeable amount of flattening, with an aspect ratio of between its semimajor axis and semiminor axis.

References

External links

SEDS Palomar 5
* * Palomar 05 Palomar 05 09792 Palomar 5 Stream {{star-cluster-stub

See also

References

External links