Gaia Map Of The Milky Way Galaxy
The Gaia space telescope is surveying stars in our galaxy and local galactic neighborhood in order to build a precise 3D map of the Milky Way and answer questions about its structure, origin and evolution. To achieve its scientific aims, it points with ultra-high precision, and to enable the control team to monitor spacecraft performance, Gaia regularly reports to the ground information about its current attitude and the stars that have been observed. These engineering data have been accumulated over 18 months and combined to create a "map" of the observed star densities, from which this ghostly virtual image of our Milky Way galaxy can be discerned, showing the attendant globular clusters and Magellanic clouds. Where there are more stars, as in the galactic center, the map is brighter; where there are fewer, the map is darker. The map includes brightness data corresponding to several million stars.
Size: 4321px × 2161px
Photo credit: © Photo Researchers / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: -sky, 3d, agency, andromeda, astrometry, astronomical, astronomy, astrophotography, astrophysics, body, cartography, celestial, cloud, cluster, craft, deep, density, dust, dwarf, emission, esa, european, exploration, gaia, galactic, galaxies, galaxy, gas, globular, heavenly, imaging, interstellar, large, lmc, magellanic, map, mapping, mechanics, milky, mission, object, observatory, photometry, plane, probe, satellite, science, sky, small, smc, space, spacecraft, spectrometry, star, stellar, structure, universe
