Variable stars, those cosmic objects that have levels of brightness that change, aren’t exactly easy to find in the Cosmos. However, astronomers of China managed to find 72 of them in the open cluster known as NGC 2355 after they’ve used the NOWT telescope (Nanshan One-meter Wide-field Telescope), according to Phys.org.
The NGC 2355 cluster is located about 5,400 light-years away from Earth in the Gemini constellation, and a team of astronomers who were led by Hong Wang of Xinjiang Astronomical Observatory in Xinjiang (China) has been diligent enough to try to find out exactly what’s cooking in that region of space.
The researchers wrote as Phys.org quotes:
We have investigated the variable stars in the field surrounding NGC 2355 based on the time-series photometric observation data. More than 3,000 CCD frames were obtained in the V band spread over 13 nights with the Nanshan One-meter Wide-field Telescope.
The NGC 2355 open cluster is located 1,100 light-years above our Milky Way galaxy’s plane. The cluster is also very old, as it formed about 1 billion years ago. In other words, if you would look 1 billion light-years away from Earth in the same place where the open cluster is, using a telescope, you wouldn’t see the cosmic structure anymore.
The Gemini constellation is located in the northern part of the hemisphere, and it’s also one of the constellations of the zodiac. Claudius Ptolemy, an astronomer who lived in the 2nd century, analyzed the constellation as well, along with 47 other constellations.
Apart from being an astronomer, Ptolemy was also a mathematician, geographer, astrologer, and music theorist. He also wrote about a dozen scientific treatises. He was born in Alexandria (Egypt) and was of Roman nationality.
Of all the newfound stars by the astronomers of China, 52 were found to be pulsating stars, four were rotating variables, and 26 were eclipsing binaries. Some of them are unclear types of variable stars.
