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Rare cluster 34 EP

NGC 5634

RA 217.4053° · Dec -5.9764° · openngc

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Score breakdown

· 4 badges
34 pts · Rare
Rare 50 pts → Epic
  • Globular cluster +14
  • Coming towards us +10
  • Star cluster +7
  • On the zodiac +3
Total score 34

16 more points to reach Epic.

Badges

  • Star cluster · +7
  • Globular cluster · +14
  • On the zodiac · +3
  • Coming towards us · +10

Trivia

What it actually is

  • What it actually is. A globular cluster: hundreds of thousands of stars packed into a ball a few dozen light-years across, orbiting far out in the galaxy's halo.

Sense of scale

  • Sense of scale. Stand on a planet near its core and the night sky would blaze with thousands of stars brighter than Venus. There would be no true darkness.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 10.1 you'll want a small backyard telescope, over in Virgo.
  • Seen from everywhere. It sits almost on the celestial equator, so it can be seen from essentially anywhere on Earth.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around April — that's when to go looking.

Its true colour

  • Its true colour. Globulars glow yellow-orange because they are ancient — around 12 billion years old, with every hot blue star long since burned out.

How we came to know it

  • The New General Catalogue. Its NGC number comes from J. L. E. Dreyer's 1888 catalogue, itself built on decades of sky sweeps by William Herschel and his sister Caroline.

Properties

constellation
Vir
dso type
GCl
mag
10.05
name
NGC 5634
radial velocity kms
-16
size arcmin
4.5

Nearby objects

About NGC 5634

NGC 5634 is a rare cluster. It sits in the constellation Vir and shines at apparent magnitude 10.05.

A globular cluster: hundreds of thousands of stars packed into a ball a few dozen light-years across, orbiting far out in the galaxy's halo.

How to see it

Look for NGC 5634 in the constellation Vir. At apparent magnitude 10.05, a small backyard telescope will bring it into view.

Like any astronomical target, NGC 5634 is best seen from a dark site away from city lights, and when it is above the horizon depends on your latitude and the time of year. The visibility panel above works out tonight's viewing window for your saved location.

Why NGC 5634 is a rare cluster

NGC 5634 scores 34 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 16 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 4 science badges — Star cluster, Globular cluster, On the zodiac and Coming towards us — each earned for a real, measurable property of the object. Rarity on Spacedle is never random: the more remarkable an object's astrophysics, the more badges it collects, the higher it scores, and the rarer it ranks.