Search for and Characterization of Galactic Open Clusters with 2MASS

TL;DR

This study developed a star-counting algorithm applied to the 2MASS catalog, successfully rediscovering nearly 500 open clusters and identifying new cluster candidates, including a young star cluster candidate HDG 01.

Contribution

The paper introduces a novel star-counting method for detecting galactic open clusters and demonstrates its effectiveness on the 2MASS catalog, uncovering both known and new clusters.

Findings

Nearly 500 open clusters rediscovered

89 globular clusters identified

One new young cluster candidate HDG 01

Abstract

We have developed a star-counting algorithm and tested it on the 2MASS star catalog to search for density enhancements significantly above the field in Galactic latitude $|b|<50^{\circ}$. Nearly 500 open clusters are "rediscovered", along with 89 globular clusters, 35 galaxies, 55 galaxy clusters, 11 H II regions, and 4 regions contaminated by nearby bright stars. Fifty-two density enhancement regions remain unaccounted for. Here we present one such candidate HDG\,01, $(\ell, b)=(144.9038, 0.4338)$ which has an angular size of 3', a distance of 1.5 kpc, hence a physical size of 3.7 pc. Due to some nebulous shape, this star cluster should be an young-aged ($\le 10$ Myr).