AAO image reference AAT 76b. « Previous || Next »
Top left is NE. Image width is about 46 arc min
Image and text © 2000-2002, Anglo-Australian Observatory, photograph by David Malin.
Among the many spectacular objects in the southern skies are two magnificent naked-eye globular clusters, omega Centauri and 47 Tucanae. These ancient cities of stars are captives of the Milky Way but were formed long before our Galaxy assumed its present shape, indeed these clusters have some of the oldest known stars. 47 Tuc is about 15,000 light years distant and contains several million stars, as many as some minor galaxies. The crowded central region leads to occasional stellar encounters and it is in 47 Tuc that rapidly-spinning pulsars have recently been discovered by radio astronomers. Though the light of globular clusters is dominated by so-called 'red' giant stars, their colour is no redder than a domestic tungsten lamp, so the true colour of 47 Tuc is close to the pale yellow reproduced here.
Entry from NGC 2000.0 (R.W. Sinnott, Ed.) © Sky Publishing Corporation, 1988:
NGC 104 Gb 00 24.1 -72 05 s Tuc 30.94.0 glob. cl. !! vB, vL, vmCMRelated Images
AAT 76. The globular cluster 47 Tucanae, NGC 104
AAT 76a. The globular cluster 47 Tucanae, NGC 104 (wide angle, landscape)
For details of photographic exposure, search technical table by AAT reference number.