FSR584 - a new globular cluster in the Galaxy?

Abstract

We investigate the nature of the recently catalogued star cluster candidate FSR584, which is projected in the direction of the molecular cloud W3 and may be the nearest globular cluster to the Sun. 2MASS CMDs, the stellar radial density profile, and proper motions are employed to derive fundamental and structural parameters. The CMD morphology and the radial density profile show that FSR584 is an old star cluster. With proper motions, the properties of FSR584 are consistent with a metal-poor globular cluster with a well-defined turnoff and evidence of a blue horizontal-branch. FSR584 might be a Palomar-like halo globular cluster that is moving towards the Galactic plane. The distance from the Sun is approx 1.4kpc, and it is located at approx 1kpc outside the Solar circle. The radial density profile is characterized by a core radius of rc=0.3+/-0.1 pc. However, we cannot exclude the possibility of an old open cluster. Near-infrared photometry coupled to proper motions support the scenario where FSR584 is a new globular cluster in the Galaxy. The absorption is A_V=9.2+/-0.6$, which makes it a limiting object in the optical and explains why it has so far been overlooked

Astronomy and Astrophysics, accepted. 6 pages and 6 figures

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Cited by in corpus (8)

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• NTT follow-up observations of star cluster candidates from the FSR catalogue
• FSR0190 - Another old distant galactic cluster
• A populous intermediate-age open cluster and evidence of an embedded cluster among the FSR globular cluster candidates
• The old Galactic open clusters FSR1716 and Czernik23
• UKIRT follow-up observations of the old open cluster FSR0358 (Kirkpatrick1)