Free Astronomy Magazine March-April 2016

SPACE CHRONICLES Carina Nebula, but also the young- est. However, it is fast making up for lost time, forming stars at an incred- ible rate and putting on a stunning visual display. This region of space houses one of Dazzling diamonds by NASA S ingle stars are often overlooked in favour of their larger cosmic cousins — but when they join forces, they create truly breathtaking scenes to rival even the most glowing of nebulae or swirling of galaxies. This NASA/ESA Hub- ble Space Telescope image features the star cluster Trumpler 14. One of the larg- est gatherings of hot, massive and bright stars in the Milky Way, this clus- ter houses some of the most luminous stars in our entire galaxy. Around 1100 open clusters have so far been discover- ed within the Milky Way, although many more are thought to exist. Trumpler 14 is one of these, locat- ed some 8000 light- years away towards the centre of the well-known Carina Nebula. At a mere 500,000 years old — a small fraction of the Pleia- des open cluster’s age of 115 million years — Trumpler 14 is not only one of the most populous clusters within the T his NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image features the star cluster Trumpler 14. One of the largest gatherings of hot, massive and bright stars in the Milky Way, this cluster houses some of the most luminous stars in our entire galaxy. [NASA & ESA, Jesús Maíz Apellániz (Cen- tro de Astrobiología, CSIC-INTA, Spain)]