NASA Hubble Space Telescope Refines Distance to Pleiades Star Cluster

Astronomers using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope have helped settle a
mystery that has puzzled scientists concerning the exact distance to the
famous nearby star cluster known as the Pleiades, or the Seven Sisters.
The Pleiades cluster, named by the ancient Greeks, is easily seen as a
small grouping of stars lying near the shoulder of Taurus, the Bull, in
the winter sky. Although it might be expected that the distance to this
well-studied cluster would be well established, there has been an
ongoing controversy among astronomers about its distance for the past
seven years.

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The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) is operated by the
Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc. (AURA), for
NASA, under contract with the Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt,
Md. The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation
between NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA).