Milky Way : Science World Report

Jul 11, 2013 08:13 PM EDT

Billion-Star Surveyor GAIA Will Launch This Year to 3D Map Our Galaxy

Gaia’s main goal is to create a highly accurate 3D map of our Milky Way Galaxy by repeatedly observing a billion stars to determine their precise positions in space and their motions through it.

Jun 04, 2013 09:10 AM EDT

Milky Way Galaxy's Local Arm Far Larger Than Previously Thought

Astronomers once thought that our Solar System's Milky Way galaxy resided in a small structure called the Local Arm. Now, though, they've discovered that the Local Arm is far larger than previously thought and is more like the adjacent major arms rather than a small spur.

Feb 14, 2013 11:16 AM EST

Dark Nebula Contrasts in Front of Milky Way's Bright Core

The full splendor of the billions of stars crammed together in the core region of our galaxy is illustrated by a small dark nebula contrasting in front of it, featured in this new image shot by the European Southern Observatory (ESO).

Feb 13, 2013 03:22 PM EST

Baby Black Hole of Milky Way May Created by Rare Explosion

A highly distorted supernova remnant shown in the image below may contain the most recent black hole formed in the Milky Way galaxy. The image combines X-rays from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory in blue and green, radio data from the NSF's Very Large Array in pink, and infrared data from Caltech's...

Feb 06, 2013 02:49 PM EST

Starbreeding Seagull Nebula Shows Youthful Strength of Our Galaxy

A new image of the Seagull Nebula from the European Southern Observatory (ESO) shows a small section of this complex cloud of dust and glowing gas. The name comes from the wispy red clouds that form part of the "wings" of the celestial bird and this picture reveals an intriguing mix of dark and glow...

Feb 02, 2013 11:44 AM EST

Intergalactic Roadkill: Suicidal Speeding Marginalized Dwarf Galaxies

A tragic case of intergalactic roadkill might be the solution of one of the great mysteries of the universe: where is all the matter? And that just regards the 5% of the universe consisting of matter that we can observe, while 75% is hidden dark energy, and another 20% dark matter. But we don't even...

Jan 09, 2013 04:19 PM EST

Galactic skeleton of Milky Way discovered partly

Our Milky Way is a spiral galaxy - a pinwheel-shaped collection of stars, gas and dust. It has a central bar and two major spiral arms that wrap around its disk. Since we view the Milky Way from the inside, its exact structure is difficult to determine.

Jan 07, 2013 07:19 PM EST

461 more Kepler exoplanets found, analysis expects 17 billion Earth-sized planets

Kepler mission scientists announced Monday that a new batch of analysis yielded 461 more exoplanet candidates - and that is from within a relatively small cross-section of our galaxy, bringing the total number of potential planets awaiting confirmation to 2,740. Of the several dozen Earth-sized plan...

Jan 03, 2013 11:42 AM EST

Galactic fireworks of exploding stars formed gigantic cloud towers of Milky-Way

Currents of gas are flowing upwards and downwards from the core of our Milky Way galaxy plane, and were now detected and analyzed by astronomers from Australia, the USA, Italy and The Netherlands, who published their findings in the journal Nature today.