中文翻譯:
在遙遠的星空中，有一個特別的大星團叫做M2。這個星團非常龐大，是銀河系中數量最多的老星星之一，裡面有大約150,000顆星星！它就在名叫水瓶座的星座方向，距離我們大約55,000光年。早在18世紀，天文學家查爾斯·梅西耶就把它列入了一個特別的名單，他當時以為它是個沒有星星的星雲。不過現在，哈勃太空望遠鏡拍下的照片讓我們能清楚地看到這些星星。這個古老的星團已有約130億年的歷史，真的是一個神秘又美麗的地方！最近，科學家還發現了與M2有關的星星碎片，這是星星早期演變的證據，讓我們更加了解它的故事。
原文:
After the Crab Nebula, this giant star cluster is the second entry in 18th century astronomer Charles Messier’s famous list of things that are not comets. M2 is one of the largest globular star clusters now known to roam the halo of our Milky Way galaxy. Though Messier originally described it as a nebula without stars, this stunning Hubble image resolves stars across the cluster’s central 40 light-years. Its population of stars numbers close to 150,000, concentrated within a total diameter of around 175 light-years. About 55,000 light-years distant toward the constellation Aquarius, this ancient denizen of the Milky Way, also known as NGC 7089, is 13 billion years old. An extended stellar debris stream, a signature of past gravitational tidal disruption, was recently found to be associated with Messier 2.
來源:NASA每日圖片
