NASA's Tess Spacecraft Triples Size of Pleiades Star Cluster
12 days ago
- #astronomy
- #TESS
- #Pleiades
- Astronomers used NASA’s TESS and other observatories to study the Pleiades, revealing a Greater Pleiades Complex with over 3,000 stars spanning 1,900 light-years.
- The Pleiades, also known as Messier 45, is a bright star cluster with about 1,000 members, visible in the northern constellation Taurus.
- Andrew Boyle and his team identified stars related to the Pleiades using data from ESA’s Gaia satellite and TESS, focusing on rotation, chemistry, and Milky Way orbits.
- TESS data helped determine stellar rotation rates and ages, narrowing down Pleiades-related stars by matching their rotation slowdown with the cluster’s age.
- The Greater Pleiades Complex likely formed as a tighter cluster 100 million years ago, dispersing due to supernovae and galactic tidal forces.
- Boyle and Bouma are developing the TESS All-Sky Rotation Survey to study rotation data for over 8 million stars, uncovering more hidden stellar connections.
- The findings highlight TESS’s role in advancing astronomy, from studying distant stars to improving planetary defense and understanding our universe.