Barnard 68

500 Lj

Milky Way

Barnard 68 • LDN 57

Barnard 68 is a dark cloud, or Bok globule. It lies in the southern constellation Ophiuchus and is about 500 light years away. The interior of the cloud is very cold, the temperature is about 16 K ( -257 ° C). The total mass is about twice the mass of the sun, the cloud has an area of ​​half a light year.

The catalog name of the dark cloud goes back to the fact that the astronomer Edward Emerson Barnard included it in his 1927 published and 350 objects comprehensive catalog of dark nebulae 1919.