This group of stars has many names. Messier 45, the Pleiades, the Seven Sisters, or even Subaru, as known in Japan. At 444 light-years distant, it is the closest Messier catalog object to Earth. This iconic cluster is quite easy to spot at night, given the brightness of the stars. As far as cosmic lifetimes go, they are also quite young, estimated to have formed within the last 100 million years.
