Text Size  Hubble Watching Ancient Orbs Stars. So many stars. ›
Larger image   M 4 is relatively close to us, lying 7200 light-
years distant, making it a prime object for study. It contains
several tens of thousands stars and is noteworthy in being home
to many white dwarfs — the cores of ancient, dying stars whose
outer layers have drifted away into space.   Amateur stargazers
may like to track M 4 down in the night sky. Use binoculars or a
small telescope to scan the skies near the orange-red star
Antares in Scorpius. M 4 is bright for a globular cluster, but
it won’t look anything like Hubble’s detailed image: it will
appear as a fuzzy ball of light in your eyepiece. Credit:
ESA/NASA