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                           Astronomy Picture of the Day   
      
       Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our   
         fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation   
                       written by a professional astronomer.   
      
                                 2024 December 19   
      
                                     Messier 2   
                 Image Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, G. Piotto et al.   
      
      Explanation: After the Crab Nebula, this giant star cluster is the   
      second entry in 18th century astronomer Charles Messier's famous list   
      of things that are not comets. M2 is one of the largest globular star   
      clusters now known to roam the halo of our Milky Way galaxy. Though   
      Messier originally described it as a nebula without stars, this   
      stunning Hubble image resolves stars across the cluster's central 40   
      light-years. Its population of stars numbers close to 150,000,   
      concentrated within a total diameter of around 175 light-years. About   
      55,000 light-years distant toward the constellation Aquarius, this   
      ancient denizen of the Milky Way, also known as NGC 7089, is 13 billion   
      years old. An extended stellar debris stream, a signature of past   
      gravitational tidal disruption, was recently found to be associated   
      with Messier 2.   
      
                      Tomorrow's picture: the last full moon   
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          Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)   
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