Celestial hemisphere:  Southern  ·  Constellation: Tucana (Tuc)  ·  Contains:  47 Tuc  ·  47 Tuc Cluster  ·  HD1707  ·  HD2041  ·  HD2072  ·  HD2167  ·  HD2466  ·  HD2505  ·  NGC 104  ·  NGC 121
The Giant and the Dwarf - 47 Tuc & NGC 121, Massimo Di Fusco
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The Giant and the Dwarf - 47 Tuc & NGC 121

The Giant and the Dwarf - 47 Tuc & NGC 121, Massimo Di Fusco
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The Giant and the Dwarf - 47 Tuc & NGC 121

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Description

47 Tucanae or 47 Tuc (also designated as NGC 104 and Caldwell 106) is a globular cluster located in the constellation Tucana. It is about 15000 light-year from Earth and 120 light years in diameter. Due to its far southern location, 18° from the south celestial pole, it was not catalogued by European astronomers until the 1750s, when the cluster was first identified by Nicolas-Louis de Lacaille from South Africa.
47 Tucanae is the second brightest globular cluster in the sky (after Omega Centauri), and is noted for having a small very bright and dense core. It is one of the most massive globular clusters in the Galaxy, containing millions of stars. The cluster appears roughly the size of the full moon in the sky under ideal conditions.
It is not yet clear whether 47 Tucanae hosts a central black hole. Hubble Space Telescope data constrain the mass of any possible black hole at the cluster's center to be less than approximately 1500 solar masses. However, in February, 2017, astronomers announced that a black hole of some 2200 solar masses may be located in the cluster; the researchers detected the black hole's signature from the motions and distributions of pulsars in the cluster. However, a recent analysis of an updated and more extensive timing data set on these pulsars provides no solid evidence in favor of the existence of a black hole.

NGC 121 is the oldest globular cluster in the Small Magellanic Cloud, which is a dwarf satellite galaxy of the Milky Way. This cluster was first discovered by English astronomer John Herschel on September 20, 1835. The compiler of the New General Catalogue, Danish astronomer John Louis Emil Dreyer, described this object as "pretty bright, pretty small, little extended, very gradually brighter middle". The cluster is located at a distance of around 200000 light-year from the Sun.

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