Pleiades (M45)

Object Type: Reflection Nebula
Top image - AP 5" Refractor, 150 min; Bottom image - APO 80mm, 100 min.

The Pleiades, or Seven Sisters (Messier 45), is a bright open star cluster about 440 light-years away in Taurus, the most obvious cluster to the naked eye. It is dominated by hot, luminous blue B-type stars that formed within roughly the last 100 million years. The soft blue haze around the brightest stars is a reflection nebula, once thought to be leftover birth material but now known to be an unrelated dust cloud the cluster is drifting through. The Pleiades appear in the sky lore of cultures worldwide.