The globular cluster cataloged as NGC 6325 lies about 26,000 light-years away from the Solar System toward the constellation of Ophiuchus and only 3,600 light-years from the center of our galaxy. It is one of one hundred and sixty currently known globular clusters orbiting the disk of the Milky Way.
globular clusters, or what?
Like all known objects of this type, these can also serve as a kind of useful laboratory for studying the processes of star formation and evolution. Globular clusters usually consist of old, developed stars comparable in age to galaxies (the youngest known globular cluster around the Milky Way is about 6.5 billion years old, the oldest is 12.5 billion years old). Given that the stars that form it are formed more or less at the same time, from matter of similar chemical composition, scientists can observe differences in the evolution of stars depending, for example, on their mass.
Also read: The Milky Way is not what you think it is. We were so wrong
What is the cluster center of NGC 6325?
Hubble observations In this particular case, they were not intended to study stellar evolution. Scientists decided to look inside the mass of a so-called intermediate mass black hole. Thus, we are talking about an object much larger than the supernova explosion black holes at the end of the life of a massive star, but also much less massive than the supermassive black holes that can be found in the centers of galaxies. The search for this rarely discovered object was prompted by suspicions arising from the observation of the slightly distorted motion of stars in the center of mass.
As a general rule, stars within globular clusters separate as they evolve. As the lighter stars fly past the more massive stars, they gain more speed and are gradually ejected toward the outer regions of the cluster. Therefore, the most massive stars are concentrated around its center. As a result, older globular clusters show an increase in stellar density the closer they get to their center. However, scientists suspect that there could simply be a supermassive black hole at the center of some clusters, including NGC 6325. The Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) of the Hubble Space Telescope has been used to search for such black holes at the centers of globular clusters, Including NGC 6325. In the course of this research, the above image of a very charming cluster was created. The star-rich blue center appears in the upper left part of the frame. It is surrounded by a slightly narrower cluster of orange and red stars.
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