The Leo Cluster (

Abell Abell may refer to: People * Abell (surname) *George O. Abell, of the astronomical catalogues fame Places ;United States * Abell, Maryland, a location in St. Mary's County, Maryland * Abell, a neighborhood in Baltimore, Maryland * Abells Corne ...

1367) is a

galaxy cluster A galaxy cluster, or a cluster of galaxies, is a structure that consists of anywhere from hundreds to thousands of galaxies that are bound together by gravity, with typical masses ranging from 1014 to 1015 solar masses. They are the second-la ...

about 330 million

light-year A light-year, alternatively spelled light year, is a large unit of length used to express astronomical distances and is equivalent to about 9.46 trillion kilometers (), or 5.88 trillion miles ().One trillion here is taken to be 101 ...

s distant ( z = 0.022) in the constellation Leo, with at least 70 major galaxies. The galaxy known as

NGC 3842 NGC 3842 is an elliptical galaxy in the constellation of Leo. It was discovered by William Herschel. It is notable for containing one of the largest black holes ever detected, reported to have a mass of 9.7 billion solar masses. It is around 3 ...

is the brightest member of this cluster. Along with the Coma Cluster, it is one of the two major clusters comprising the Coma Supercluster, which in turn is part of the

CfA2 Great Wall The Great Wall (also called Coma Wall), sometimes specifically referred to as the CfA2 Great Wall, is an immense galaxy filament. It is one of the largest known superstructures in the observable universe. This structure was discovered c. 1989 ...

, which is hundreds of millions light years long and is one of the largest known structures in the universe. A team of scientists decided to observe the Leo Cluster with the intention of creating a catalog of extended ionized gas (EIG) clouds. This data also led to the discovery of many star-forming parents (galaxies) within the cluster. These star-forming galaxies turned out to be very similar to those found in the neighboring Coma cluster. The EIGs in the Leo cluster, however, turned out to be longer in the Leo cluster than the Coma cluster. This likely means that the Leo cluster and its stars are probably younger than most comparable clusters in the universe and evolve at a different pace. Most dense galaxy clusters are composed mostly of elliptical galaxies. The Leo Cluster, however, mostly contains spiral galaxies, suggesting that it is much younger than other comparable clusters, such as the Coma Cluster. It is also home to one of the universe's largest known black holes, which lies in the center of

. The black hole is 9.7 billion times more massive than the Sun. It can be very difficult for stars to form within the Leo Cluster. This is because infalling galaxies have a tendency to strip gas away from other stars that are attempting to form. This has led to the creation of a "hot zone" where stars are unable to maintain their gas long enough to properly form. There appears to be a number of subpopulations within the Leo Cluster. The first consists of elliptical galaxies that seem to be roughly as old as the universe. The second subpopulation contains red-sequence lenticular (lens shaped) galaxies whose ages are directly tied to their mass. The third and final subpopulation is of galaxies where star formation is still taking place, and are morphologically distributed.

References

External links

The Coma Supercluster
with images of A1367
Abell 1367 - The Leo Galaxy Cluster
*http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/07/03/leo_cluster_a_buzzing_hive_of_galaxies.html *http://www.cloudynights.com/page/articles/cat/column/small-wonders/small-wonders-leo-r486 {{galaxy-cluster-stub 1367 Coma Supercluster Great Wall filament Abell richness class 2 Galaxy clusters Leo (constellation)

See also

References

External links