Celestial hemisphere:  Southern  ·  Constellation: Scorpius (Sco)  ·  Contains:  Butterfly Cluster  ·  M 6  ·  NGC 6405
The Butterfly Cluster, Matthew Sole
The Butterfly Cluster
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The Butterfly Cluster

The Butterfly Cluster, Matthew Sole
The Butterfly Cluster
Powered byPixInsight

The Butterfly Cluster

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Description

M6 - The Butterfly Cluster

A brilliant open cluster from the southern constellation of Scorpius.

The 80 stars that make up M6 are all moving through space together in an area spanning about 12 to 25 light years across – and may have formed anywhere from 51 to 95 million years ago.

The brightest of its stars is a variable known as BM Scorpii, a yellow or orange supergiant that changes its magnitude between 5.5 and 7 with a semi-regular period. However, most of the stars here are hot, blue main sequence stars of spectral type B4-B5.

The stars in this cluster were formed in the same giant molecular cloud and are still loosely bound to each other.

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The Butterfly Cluster, Matthew Sole

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Southern Hemisphere Astro