NGC 3114 is a sparseopen cluster which is projected onto the outskirts of theCarina complex.[2]
Because of the high number of fieldstars from thedisc of the Milky Way, it is very difficultobject to study[2] as this contamination makes its size ambiguous.
NGC 3114 has first been subject of studies in 1963, when Jankowitz and McCosh obtained photographicUBV photometry for 171 of its stars and photoelectric UBV photometry of 52 stars. They estimated thecluster to be 910parsecs from theSun, its meanvisual extinction and its age to range from and years.[2]
In 1988, Schneider and Weiss obtainedphotometry data for 122 stars, revising the clusterreddening to be.[2]
Three years later, Sagar and Sharpless made the largest data recording of the cluster to date, obtaining BVCCD photometry of around 350 stars from seven 3.6'×5.4' regions. Because these regions were rather far from the cluster centre, a substantial contamination was expected. Nevertheless, by assuming the cluster reddening value obtained by Schneider and Weiss, they found the cluster to be pc, which agreed with the measurements taken 28 years previously by Jankowitz and McCosh. They also found the age of the cluster to be years.[2]
Finally, in 1989 Claria' et al. estimated the clusterchemical abundance, finding that NGC 3114 has basically the samemetal richness as the Sun, for which[2] (Fe -Iron, H -Hydrogen).
^abcdefG. Carraro, F. Patat, "Star clusters in the Carina complex: UBVRI photometry of NGC 3114, Colliner 228 and vdB-Hage 99*, A&A,Volume 379, Number 1, November 2001, pp. 136-146
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