ESA ESO VISTA: New globular star clusters found in Milky Way

This image from VISTA is a tiny part of the VISTA Variables in the Via Lactea (VVV) survey that is systematically studying the central parts of the Milky Way in infrared light. 

On the right lies the globular star cluster UKS 1 and on the left lies a much less conspicuous new discovery, VVV CL001 - a previously unknown globular, one of just 160 known globular clusters in the Milky Way at the time of writing. 

The new globular appears as a faint grouping of stars about 25 percent of the width of the image from the left edge, and about 60 percent of the way from bottom to top. Credit: ESO/D. Minniti/VVV Team.

The dazzling globular cluster called UKS 1 dominates the right-hand side of the first of the new infrared images from ESO's VISTA survey telescope at the Paranal Observatory in Chile.

But if you can drag your gaze away, there is a surprise lurking in this very rich star field - a fainter globular cluster that was discovered in the data from one of VISTA's surveys.

You will have to look closely to see the other star cluster, which is called VVV CL001: it is a small collection of stars in the left half of the image.

But VVV CL001 is just the first of VISTA's globular discoveries. The same team has found a second object, dubbed VVV CL002.

This small and faint grouping may also be the globular cluster that is the closest known to the centre of the Milky Way.

The discovery of a new globular cluster in our Milky Way is very rare. The last one was discovered in 2010, and only 158 globular clusters were known in our galaxy before the new discoveries.

These new clusters are early discoveries from the VISTA Variables in the Via Lactea (VVV) survey that is systematically studying the central parts of the Milky Way in infrared light.

The VVV team is led by Dante Minniti (Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile) and Philip Lucas (Centre for Astrophysics Research, University of Hertfordshire, UK).