Messier 48

Quality 0.50 · 0 views · Updated 2 months ago

Open cluster in the constellation Hydra

title: "Messier 48" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["open-clusters", "orion–cygnus-arm", "hydra-(constellation)", "messier-objects", "ngc-objects", "astronomical-objects-discovered-in-1771", "discoveries-by-charles-messier"] description: "Open cluster in the constellation Hydra" topic_path: "general/open-clusters" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messier_48" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Open cluster in the constellation Hydra ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox open cluster"]

Field	Value
name	Messier 48
image	[[File:M48 Mazur.jpg
caption	Open cluster Messier 48 in Hydra
epoch	J2000
ra
dec
constellation	Hydra
dist_ly	770 pc
appmag_v	5.8
size_v
mass_msol
radius_ly
age	Myr
names	M48, NGC 2548, Cr 179, H IV-22
::

Messier 48 or M48, also known as NGC 2548, is an open cluster of stars in the equatorial constellation of Hydra. It sits near Hydra's westernmost limit with Monoceros, about to the east and slightly south of Hydra's brightest star, Alphard. This grouping was discovered by Charles Messier in 1771, but there is no cluster precisely where Messier indicated; he made an error, as he did with M47. The value that he gave for the right ascension matches, however, his declination is off by five degrees. Credit for discovery is sometimes given instead to Caroline Herschel in 1783. Her nephew John Herschel described it as, "a superb cluster which fills the whole field; stars of 9th and 10th to the 13th magnitude – and none below, but the whole ground of the sky on which it stands is singularly dotted over with infinitely minute points".

M48 is visible to the naked eye under good atmospheric conditions. The brightest member is the star HIP 40348 at visual magnitude 8.3. The cluster is located some 770 pc from the Sun. The age estimated from isochrones is Myr, while gyrochronology age estimate is Myr – in good agreement. This makes it intermediate in age between the Pleiades, at around 100 Myr, and the Hyades, at about 650 Myr. The metallicity of the cluster, based on the abundance of iron (Fe), is [Fe/H] = , where −1 would be ten times lower than in the Sun. It is more metal-poor than the Pleiades, Hyades, and Praesepe clusters.

The cluster has a tidal radius of 19.4 ± with at least 438 members and a mass of . The general structure of the cluster is fragmented and lumpy, which may be due to interactions with the galactic disk. The cluster is now subdivided into three groups, each of which has its own collective proper motion.

References

| first1=Roger W. | last1=Sinnott | first2=Michael A. C. | last2=Perryman | title=Millennium Star Atlas | page=810 | volume=2 | year=1997 | isbn=0-933346-83-2 | publisher=Sky Publishing Corporation and the European Space Agency }}

| title=WIYN Open Cluster Study LXXIX. M48 (NGC 2548) I. Radial Velocities, Rotational Velocities, and Metallicities of Stars in the Open Cluster M48 (NGC 2548) | display-authors=1 | last1=Sun | first1=Qinghui | last2=Deliyannis | first2=Constantine P. | last3=Steinhauer | first3=Aaron | last4=Twarog | first4=Bruce A. | last5=Anthony-Twarog | first5=Barbara J. | journal=The Astronomical Journal | postscript=. | volume=159 | issue=5 | id=220 | pages=13 | date=May 2020 | arxiv=2004.06812 | bibcode=2020AJ....159..220S | doi=10.3847/1538-3881/ab83ef | s2cid=215769094 | doi-access=free }}

| title=A color-period diagram for the open cluster M 48 (NGC 2548), and its rotational age | last1=Barnes | first1=Sydney A. | last2=Weingrill | first2=Joerg | last3=Granzer | first3=Thomas | last4=Spada | first4=Federico | last5=Strassmeier | first5=Klaus G. | display-authors=1 | journal=Astronomy & Astrophysics | volume=583 | id=A73 | pages=21 | date=November 2015 | doi=10.1051/0004-6361/201526129 | postscript=. | bibcode=2015A&A...583A..73B | arxiv=1511.00554 | s2cid=118822665 }}

| title=NGC 2548: clumpy spatial and kinematic structure in an intermediate-age Galactic cluster | last1=Vicente | first1=Belén | last2=Sánchez | first2=Néstor | last3=Alfaro | first3=Emilio J. | display-authors=1 | journal=Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society | volume=461 | issue=3 | pages=2519–2526 | date=September 2016 | doi=10.1093/mnras/stw1487 | doi-access=free | arxiv=1606.06044 | bibcode=2016MNRAS.461.2519V | postscript=. }}

| last=Houston | first=Walter Scott | author-link=Walter Scott Houston | title=Deep-Sky Wonders | postscript=. | publisher=Sky Publishing Corporation | year=2005 | isbn=978-1-931559-23-2 }}

| last1=Wu | first1 =Zhen-Yu | last2=Zhou | first2 =Xu | last3=Ma | first3 =Jun | last4=Du | first4 =Cui-Hua | title=The orbits of open clusters in the Galaxy | journal=Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society | volume=399 | issue=4 | pages=2146–2164 | date=November 2009 | arxiv=0909.3737 | bibcode=2009MNRAS.399.2146W | doi=10.1111/j.1365-2966.2009.15416.x | doi-access=free | s2cid=6066790 | postscript=. }}

| last1=Piskunov | first1=A. E. | last2=Schilbach | first2=E. | last3=Kharchenko | first3=N. V. | last4=Röser | first4=S. | last5=Scholz | first5=R.-D. | display-authors=1 | title=Tidal radii and masses of open clusters | journal=Astronomy and Astrophysics | volume=477 | issue=1 | pages=165–172 | date=January 2008 | doi=10.1051/0004-6361:20078525 | bibcode=2008A&A...477..165P | postscript=. | doi-access=free }}

| title=A Field Guide to Deep-Sky Objects | first=Mike | last=Inglis | date=2011 | page=110 | isbn=9781461412663 | publisher=Springer New York | postscript=. | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZM_K3XlND-0C&pg=PA110 }}

References

"M 48".

::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::