--- title: "Something Is Ripping Apart the Nearest Star Cluster to Earth" description: "An invisible force is tearing apart the closest star cluster to the Solar System — and astronomers are trying to figure out why." date: "2021-03-25" modified: "2021-03-25" authors: - name: "Victor Tangermann" job_title: "Senior Editor" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/victor" url: "https://futurism.com/something-ripping-apart-nearest-star-cluster-earth" categories: - "Science & Energy" tags: - "ESA" - "ESO" - "gaia" - "star cluster" --- # Something Is Ripping Apart the Nearest Star Cluster to Earth ![An invisible force is tearing apart the closest star cluster to the Solar System — and astronomers are trying to figure out why.]() *\Image: ESA\* An invisible force is tearing apart the closest star cluster to the Solar System — and astronomers are trying to figure out what it is, as [*Science Alert* reports](). The ripping apart isn't much of a surprise in and of itself. Gravitational forces tend to rend apart star clusters to form tidal streams, which are essentially rivers of stars. But something else, far more violent, appears to be causing the stars in the Hyades cluster, some 153 light years away, to be obliterated and scattered. The European Space Agency's Gaia space observatory has been helping scientists create a detailed three dimensional map of the Milky Way. Now, a team of astronomers from the European Space Agency and the European Southern Observatory have combed through recently released Gaia data. What they found was hundreds of stars associated with Hyades' tidal tails, which are even smaller threads of stars that emanate from both behind and in front of a given cluster. https://youtu.be/dn2Qdrz9JDo Hyades' tails alone were found to span thousands of light-years. What made them even more unusual, however, was the fact that many of the stars weren't accounted for when the team used computer simulations to map the stars' movements during their lifetime of hundreds of millions of years. In other words, something absolutely huge must have interacted with them to cause them to form these trails. "There must have been a close interaction with this really massive clump, and the Hyades just got smashed," [said Tereza Jerabkova](), ESA research fellow and lead author of [a paper about the research]() published in the journal *Astronomy & Astrophysics*. In the paper, Jerabkova and her colleagues suggest that this "massive clump" may be a "dark matter sub-halo," meaning naturally occurring clumps of dark matter that scientists believe may be shaping the galaxy. "With Gaia, the way we see the Milky Way has completely changed," Jerabokova said. "And with these discoveries, we will be able to map the Milky Way’s sub-structures much better than ever before." **READ MORE:** [Something Invisible Is Tearing Apart The Nearest Star Cluster to Earth]() \[*Science Alert*\] **More on Gaia:** *[Astronomers Discover Hannibal Lecter Stars That Wear Planet Corpses]()* ## Author I've been at Futurism since 2017, where my role has evolved to encompass design, writing, and increasingly editing. I've always been fascinated by space exploration and advanced transportation, which I've leaned into by interviewing luminaries in those fields while closely following the dimensions of policy and regulation that allow next-generation projects to succeed -- or, sometimes, to fail. I'm also keenly interested in the effects of generative AI on society, policies, and democratic institutions, as well as clean energy, physics and biology, and the vagaries of tech leadership. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Ars Technica, Gizmodo, PC Magazine, Jalopnik, Fox News, and the New York Post. I spent my childhood living in locations including Manila, the Philippines, and Geneva, Switzerland, attended McGill University, and now live in Toronto, Canada. Before Futurism I worked at AskMen and a small photography studio. In my free time, I'm an avid gardener, foodie, and craft beer lover, as well as a maker of artisanal hot pepper sauces. I have a magnificent dog named Freida. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()