Abstract:
CCD photometry of the open cluster NGC 366 has been carried out in UBVRI photometric passbands down to 19.5 mag. It is found that the reddening is non-uniforn across the cluster field., having ∆E(B – V) = 0.30 mag. A distance of 2.15 kpc and an age of 25 Myr have been obtained for the cluster. A comparison of the luminosity function (LF) of the cluster with the LFs of other young clusters, shows that the cluster LFs agree fairly well towards the higher mass end, whereas there is substantial variation in the LFs of the clusters towards fainter end. It is concluded that there is a significant excess of low mass stars in NGC 366 as compared to NGC 1931 and other young clusters.
