Located some 17,000 light-years from Earth, Omega Centauri is a massive globular star cluster, containing several million stars swirling in locked orbits around a common center of gravity.The stars are packed so densely in the cluster's core that it is difficult for ground-based telescopes to make out individual stars.
Astronomers have now used NASA's Hubble Space Telescope to peer into the center of that dense swarm of stars.
Hubble's high resolution is able to pick up where ground-based telescopes leave off, capturing distinct points of light from stars at the very center of the cluster.
Credits: NASA and The Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)
Acknowledgment: A. Cool (SFSU)
(Editor's Note: Electronic images, an expanded photo caption and additional information are available at this URL and this one and via links in this URL, this one and this one.)
[Contact: Dr. Adrienne Cool, Lisa Frattare]
06-Oct-2001
