The
Pleiades, or
Seven Sisters (
Messier 45 or
M45), is an
open star cluster containing middle-aged hot
B-type stars located in the constellation of
Taurus. It is among the nearest
star clusters to Earth and is the cluster most obvious to the
naked eye in the
night sky.
The cluster is dominated by
hot blue and extremely luminous stars that have formed within the last 100 million years. Dust that forms a faint
reflection nebulosity around the brightest stars was thought at first to be left over from the formation of the cluster, but is now known to be an unrelated dust cloud in the
interstellar medium, through which the stars are currently passing.
This is first attempt with 400 f/5.6 lens, untracked image