While the James Webb Space Telescope is in the news on a near daily basis, providing fresh infrared insights into the evolution of the cosmos, the Hubble Space Telescope remains at the forefront of visible light astronomy, capturing crystal clear images like this shot of globular cluster NGC 2419 in the constellation Lynx. Stars making up globular clusters are usually very similar because they are thought to have formed at roughly the same time. They also are thought to contain similar amounts of helium. But NGC 2419 is home to two distinct populations of red giant stars, one toward the center that is unusually helium rich. The observations raise new questions about how globular clusters form: did the two populations form together, or did the cluster form in some different manner?
Related Articles
New Horizons to continue mission of discovery with Kuiper Belt encounter
Scientists planning the the next phase of NASA’s New Horizons mission, a robotic craft that completed the first exploration of Pluto in 2015, are going into the flyby of a frozen, faraway city-sized clump of rock on New Year’s Day 2019 armed with little knowledge of the target lurking around 4 billion miles from Earth.