🔭 M44 — Beehive Cluster

Open cluster in Cancer

M44, Beehive Cluster is a open cluster in the constellation Cancer, with an apparent magnitude of about 3.7, roughly 0.577 thousand light-years away.

Data

Catalogue designation	M44
Common name	Beehive Cluster
Object type	Open cluster
Constellation	Cancer
NGC / IC	NGC 2632
Apparent magnitude	3.7
Distance (approx.)	0.577 thousand light-years

What a open cluster is

A loose, young family of a few dozen to a few thousand stars born together from the same gas cloud and drifting apart over time. The Pleiades are the most famous example.

Other Messier objects in Cancer: M67.

Data: Messier catalogue & IAU constellations, via English Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 3.0) · stored statically.