Palomar 5 is an unusual and unique globular cluster of stars orbiting in the Milky Way’s outer halo.
This star cluster has two distinct and mysterious characteristics: a low star mass compared to other star clusters. Two lengthy streaming tails of stars are expelled from the cluster that stretches outwards to much greater distances than other star tails.
Why the cluster has these features has remained a mystery, as to whether it was born this way with a low mass or evolved to be so. The reason, according to a new idea developed by an international team of astrophysicists, is that the cluster contains more black holes than usual, boosting the tail formation process.
Palomar 5 is expected to dissolve into a 100 percent black hole cluster in a billion years. The research was recently published in the journal Nature Astronomy.
Palomar 5 is a globular cluster, which is a spherical group of stars that are gravitationally bonded together. It revolves around our galaxy, the Milky Way.
It was discovered twice independently, in 1950 and 1955, and is located approximately 75,000 light-years away in the constellation Serpens.
The cluster’s stars are being torn away in the form of tails, and it is assumed to be dissolving.
