Evening star., 1951-04-13
New Telescope DeIves
In Wilderness of Space
$50 Clusters Of GoIaxies
Discovered in Two Years
By Thomas R. Henry


More than 1906. 0.0oo. 900. .00o. .o0o. .ooo,-
600 miles across the star-spangled vii.
derness Of space astronomers Of Mt.
Palomar Observatory, working with the
2o0-inch Hale telescope which has been
in use for the past two years. have dis
covered approximately $50 clusters Of
galaxies Of stars.
Each galaxy may contain something
Of the order Of 100 billion individual
stars. Of which the sun Is . fair ex-
ample. Each cluster contains several
galaxies-from i've TO twenty.
The distance (Which Is crossed by
light moving at 10000 miles q second
In about 300,000,O00 years. represents
about the frontier Of space observable
with the new telescope. the most pow
erful now on earth. The Mt. Palomar
Observatory. operated Jointly by the
California Institute Of Technology and
the Carnegie Institution Of Warrington.
is cooperating with the National Geo.
graphic Society in this survey Of the
far heavens.
Dwarf Members Discovered.
At the same time, it was announced
through the journal Of the Astronomical
Society Of the Pacific, two hitherto un-
known dwarf members Of the local clus-
ter Of galaxies have been discovered.
The two new ones were found in the
southern heavens. This may make nee
essary considerable revision Of the
theory Of galactic structure. Those
found in the past have been. with two
exceptions, in the northern heavens.
This led to the belief that the Milky
Way system was close to the southern
edge Of the cluster. The two previously
known exceptions to these geographic
cal distributions have been the two
Clouds Of Magellan In the southern
heavens. These, easily visible, are dwarf
galaxies. They are not members Of
the Milky Way aggregation but are rela-
lively near, only q few hundred light
years beyond Its southern edge. The
largest Of the other galaxies In this
system Is Messier 80 in the constella-
ton Of Andromeda, about 750 light
years away and comparable in size to
the Milky Way system itself. The other
members Of the local cluster found to
date have been considerably smaller.
The new ones are probably about the
size Of the Clouds Of Magellan.
Finding Of the circle Of galactic clus.
ters 800 million light years away indi-
Gates strongly that there is no thinning
out of matter with distance. The 200
inch telescope penetrates about twice
as far as was possible before.
One OF the announced objectiveS when
the telescope was dedicated was to push
the frontiers Of observation as far as
fnSs 70 ~ xw11S SnTa %a Aaa
ories Of the structure of the universe.
1t may be possible, for example, to de-
termine whether the cosmos actually IL
flying apart.
Speed Rises With Distance.
Observations with galaxies previously
observable have shown that the farther
the object is away from the earth the
faster is its movement away from the
earth. The rate is about 500 miles per
second per million light years. The speed
Is determined by the shift Of its light
spectrum toward the red end with
increasing distance. This Is evidence Of
movement away from the observer.
It has been impossible to determine,
moreover. whether this hying-apart
movement was universal through crea-
ton or obtained only in a limited part
of the universe. Also other interpreta-
tions than that of movement Of recession
were possible.
1t is quite likely. according to the
Mt. Palomar report, that some Of
She newly found very distant clusters
may give an opportunity for testing the
red-shift hypothesis
The distance at which the new OBJ
servationS have been made rrecl,Ides tina
possibility Of seeing such minute OBJ
ject, on the cosmic scale, as the Milky
Wax galaxy itself. A hundred billion
stars would make only an indistin-
guishable spot Of light. Thus 1t becomes
necessary to measure families Of
galaxies. the individual members Of
which cannot be distinguished.