The Coma Star Cluster (also known as Melotte 111 or Collinder 256) is a small but nearby
open cluster
An open cluster is a type of star cluster made of up to a few thousand stars that were formed from the same giant molecular cloud and have roughly the same age. More than 1,100 open clusters have been discovered within the Milky Way galaxy, and ...
located in the constellation
Coma Berenices. The cluster contains about 40 brighter stars (between magnitudes 5 and 10) with a
common proper motion. The brighter stars of the cluster make out a distinctive "V" shape as seen when Coma Berenices is rising. The cluster used to represent the tail of
Leo
Leo or Léo may refer to:
Acronyms
* Law enforcement officer
* Law enforcement organisation
* ''Louisville Eccentric Observer'', a free weekly newspaper in Louisville, Kentucky
* Michigan Department of Labor and Economic Opportunity
Arts an ...
. However, in around 240 BC,
Ptolemy III renamed it for the Egyptian queen Berenice's legendary sacrifice of her hair.
The ''
Hipparcos
''Hipparcos'' was a scientific satellite of the European Space Agency (ESA), launched in 1989 and operated until 1993. It was the first space experiment devoted to precision astrometry, the accurate measurement of the positions of celestial obj ...
'' satellite and infrared
color-magnitude diagram fitting have been used to establish a distance to the cluster's center of approximately .
The distance established via the independent analyses agree, thereby making the cluster an important rung on the
cosmic distance ladder. The open cluster is roughly twice as distant as the
Hyades and covers an area of more than 7.5 degrees on the sky.
[ The cluster is approximately 450 million years old.
]
See also
* Alpha Persei Cluster
* List of nearby stellar associations and moving groups
This is a list of nearby stellar associations and moving groups. A stellar association is a very loose star cluster, looser than an open cluster. A moving group is the remnant of such a stellar association. Members of stellar associations an ...
References
External links
*
WEBDA page for open cluster Coma Ber
by Masaryk University
Masaryk University (MU) ( cs, Masarykova univerzita; la, Universitas Masarykiana Brunensis) is the second largest university in the Czech Republic, a member of the Compostela Group and the Utrecht Network. Founded in 1919 in Brno as the sec ...
SEDS
– Melotte 111
{{DEFAULTSORT:Coma Star Cluster
Open clusters
Coma Berenices
Astronomical objects known since antiquity