ROCHESTER, N.Y., Jan. 9 (UPI) -- U.S. astronomers have discovered a massive cluster of 14 red supergiants -- super-sized stars -- on the verge of exploding in the Milky Way.
Only a few hundred such stars are known to exist in the galaxy, with the previous largest collection of them containing five, Rochester Institute of Technology reported.
Astronomers used infrared technology to penetrate the thick dust that cloaks much of the galaxy.
"It seems odd that here is a spectacularly bright cluster and that we are only seeing it now," says astronomer Don Figer, who is with the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore. "We didn't have infrared technology until recently and so people are rescanning the whole galaxy."
Figer presented his research at the American Astronomical Society meeting Monday in Washington.
Figer's finding may poke holes in some massive star formation models, which suggest that conditions are no longer favorable for this type of massive cluster formation, the university said.
Ancient globular clusters, containing even more stars, were thought to have been born only very early, at the time of the formation of the galaxy.
"But that's probably not true because we're starting to see more massive clusters," Figer said.
