Christmas Tree Cluster

The Christmas Tree Star Cluster is an open cluster in about 2500 light years away in the constellation of Monoceros with an apparent brightness of 3.9 mag.

It owes its name to the fact that it resembles a Christmas tree in visible light. It is a by astronomical standards, very young and very interesting star-forming region.

The dense gas clouds lets the light of the young stars ( protostars ) does not penetrate to the outside, so we can not see them. The infrared telescope Spitzer but delivers very impressive and for astronomers extremely insightful images. One can witness the birth of stars or less live here. The arrangement of the young star seems to confirm the theory that their spacing depends on the density and temperature of the gas cloud. These snowflakes like structure also gave him the name Snowflake cluster snowflakes or mist.

The pink and the red spots in the center are young stars that are less than a hundred thousand years old. The blue colored dots belong to the Milky Way. The green structures are mixed with organic molecules of gas clouds, which are excited from nearby stars to shine.

Discovery

William Herschel discovered the star cluster on 18 January 1784 gave him the catalog number H VIII.5.