page_title: Coma Berenices
section_title: Features
hierarchical_section_title: Coma Berenices / Features
caption_attribution_description: English: Photography of the constellation Coma Berenices, Berenice's Hair Deutsch: Fotografie des Sternbildes Coma Berenices, Haar der Berenike
context_page_description: Coma Berenices is an ancient asterism in the northern sky, which has been defined as one of the 88 modern constellations. Its non-deep-space objects are in the fourth galactic quadrant, between Leo and Boötes, and it is visible in both hemispheres. Its name means "Berenice's Hair" in Latin and refers to Queen Berenice II of Egypt, who sacrificed her long hair as a votive offering. It was introduced to Western astronomy during the third century BC by Conon of Samos and was further corroborated as a constellation by Gerardus Mercator and Tycho Brahe. It is the only modern constellation named for a historic person.
  The constellation's major stars are Alpha, Beta, and Gamma Comae Berenices. They form a half square, along the diagonal of which run Berenice's imaginary tresses, formed by the Coma Star Cluster. The constellation's brightest star is Beta Comae Berenices, a 4.2-magnitude main sequence star similar to the Sun. Coma Berenices contains the North Galactic Pole and one of the richest known galaxy clusters, the Coma Cluster, part of the Coma Supercluster. Galaxy Malin 1, in the constellation, is the first-known giant low-surface-brightness galaxy.
context_section_description: Although it is not large, Coma Berenices contains one galactic supercluster, two galactic clusters, one star cluster and eight Messier objects (including several globular clusters). These objects can be seen with minimal obscuration by dust because the constellation is not in the direction of the galactic plane. Because of that, there are few open clusters (except for the Coma Berenices Cluster, which dominates the northern part of the constellation), diffuse nebulae or planetary nebulae. Coma Berenices contains the North Galactic Pole at right ascension  12ʰ 51ᵐ 25ˢ and declination +27° 07′ 48″ (epoch J2000.0).
caption: Coma Berenices as seen by the naked eye
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