Mystery of Quintuplet stars in Milky Way solved

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A Yin and Yang in the Galactic Center. High-resolution infrared images of the dusty pinwheel nebulae are shown inset overlaid on a Hubble Space Telescope image of the Quintuplet cluster. Each of the five bright red stars is now thought to be a pinwhe ...
A Yin and Yang in the Galactic Center. High-resolution infrared images of the dusty pinwheel nebulae are shown inset overlaid on a Hubble Space Telescope image of the Quintuplet cluster. Each of the five bright red stars is now thought to be a pinwheel nebula. Credit: Peter Tuthill (Sydney U.), Keck Observatory, Donald Figer (RIT).

For the first time, scientists have identified the cluster of Quintuplet stars in the Milky Way's galactic center, next to the super massive black hole, as massive binary stars nearing the end of their life cycle, solving a mystery that had dogged astronomers for more than 15 years.


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