Magnitude +10.4 globular cluster NGC 1854 (α=05h 09m 20.2s, δ=-68° 50′ 56″ J2000.0) was discovered in 1826 by James Dunlop. It lies 135,000 light-years away in the Large Magellanic Cloud. This Hubble Space Telescope view is just 2.4 x 1.5 arcminutes in size. Click the image for a larger version. Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA.This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image shows the globular cluster NGC 1854, a gathering of white and blue stars in the southern constellation of Dorado (The Dolphinfish). NGC 1854 is located about 135,000 light-years away, in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), one of our closest cosmic neighbours and a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way.
The LMC is a hotbed of vigorous star formation. Rich in interstellar gas and dust, the galaxy is home to approximately 60 globular clusters and 700 open clusters. These clusters are frequently the subject of astronomical research, as the Large Magellanic Cloud and its little sister, the Small Magellanic Cloud, are the only systems known to contain clusters at all stages of evolution. Hubble is often used to study these clusters as its extremely high-resolution cameras can resolve individual stars, even at the clusters’ crowded cores, revealing their mass, size and degree of evolution.
A study just published by University of Texas at Austin assistant professor Steven Finkelstein and colleagues reveals that galaxies were more efficient at making stars when the universe was younger. The announcement explains the team’s discovery that there are a lot more bright, highly star-forming galaxies in the early universe than scientists previously thought.
Bok globules are dark knots of gas and dust in larger molecular clouds that we see today. New theoretical work shows that similar islands of gas enriched in heavy elements in the early universe could have held as much water vapour as we find in our galaxy today.
