Messier Collage (IMAGE)

NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center

Messier Collage

Caption

Charles Messier (1730-1817) was a French astronomer best known for his "Catalog of Nebulae and Star Clusters." An avid comet-hunter, Messier compiled his catalog of deep-sky objects to help other comet seekers avoid astronomical objects that were not comets.

Credit

R. Stoyan et al., Atlas of the Messier Objects: Highlights of the Deep Sky (Cambridge University Press, 2008)

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