Tag

Milky Way

All articles tagged with #milky way

astronomy1 day ago•119 min saved

Astrophotographer Captures Milky Way and Nebulae Above ESO's Atacama Telescopes

Astronomer José Rodrigues captured a striking image of the Milky Way arching over the European Southern Observatory's La Silla site in Chile's Atacama Desert. The photograph features the Trifid and Lagoon Nebulae within the Sagittarius constellation, positioned above the New Technology Telescope and the 3.6-meter telescope. Rodrigues, who studies exoplanets, noted the personal significance of the 3.6-meter scope, which houses instruments used to detect worlds outside our solar system.

via Space|

#astronomy #astrophotography #atacama-desert

science6 days ago•5 min saved

October 2026 Sky Guide: Saturn Opposition, Meteor Showers, and the Hunter's Moon

October 2026 offers prime viewing for Saturn at opposition on Oct. 4, the Orionid meteor shower peaking Oct. 21-22, and the Hunter's Moon on Oct. 26. The Milky Way core is visible until mid-month, and the Draconid shower occurs Oct. 8-9.

via WMTW|

#astronomy #meteor-showers #milky-way

science26 days ago•5 min saved

Last Weeks to Catch the Milky Way's Galactic Center in 2026

The Milky Way’s galactic center is nearing its best viewing window for the Northern Hemisphere in 2026, with the season typically running February through October and peak visibility from June to September. For optimal viewing, pick nights with a new moon and clear, dark skies; the center is visible from around midnight to about 5 a.m., and you don’t need a telescope—just good dark skies. Use the teapot asterism near Sagittarius/Scorpius as a guide, and consult DarkSky International for nearby dark-sky locations.

via USA Today|

#dark-skies #galactic-center #milky-way

science1 month ago•56 min saved

Counting the Cosmos: About 200 sextillion stars in the universe

Scientists estimate there are roughly 200 sextillion (2×10^23) stars in the universe by first counting the roughly 2 trillion galaxies, then multiplying by a typical galaxy’s star count (about 100 billion). Using the Milky Way as a model, they extrapolate to the entire cosmos, noting the Sun is just one of these stars and that many stars are red dwarfs. The article emphasizes how astronomers combine galaxy counts with stellar statistics to reach this staggering total.

via Yahoo|

#astronomy #galaxies #milky-way

space1 month ago•11 min saved

Milky Way–Andromeda Collision Odds Fluctuate as New Data Refine Forecasts

New studies show the forecast of a Milky Way–Andromeda merger is far from settled: a 2025 Nature Astronomy analysis using Hubble and Gaia data suggested roughly 50–50 odds for a merger within the next 10 billion years, while a 2026 follow-up with Gaia-based motions pushed the probability toward about 90% under its preferred model; the results depend on uncertain motions and nearby galaxies (Triangulum and the Large Magellanic Cloud), and they distinguish between a first close approach and a final merger. Precise proper-motion measurements—down to microarcseconds per year—are needed to narrow the forecast.

via Space Daily|

#andromeda #gaia #galaxy-merger

space1 month ago•1 min saved

Milky Way’s Outer Arms Found Farther Than Thought, Reshaping Galactic Models

Astronomers used geometric distances to dust clouds in the Milky Way's spiral arms by studying expanding X-ray rings created by distant gamma-ray bursts, capturing light echoes with Chandra and XMM-Newton. The measurements confirm the Perseus Arm's distance but show the Outer Arm and Outer Scutum–Centaurus Arm lie up to about 10% farther away than previously thought, a result that could revise galactic models. The method is direct, relying on geometry rather than rotation assumptions, though it depends on rare gamma-ray bursts and may not be widely applicable soon.

via BBC Sky at Night Magazine|

#distance-measurements #gamma-ray-bursts #milky-way

science1 month ago•16 min saved

Skyglow Swallows the Milky Way for Over a Third of Humanity

Artificial skyglow now hides the Milky Way from more than a third of humanity, not because the galaxy has dimmed but because urban lighting brightens the night sky. A 2016 atlas using satellite radiance and 35,000 ground observations estimated that about 83% of people live under light-polluted skies, with the Milky Way’s visibility falling below a defined threshold under typical clear-sky conditions. Visibility varies by location, weather, and dark-adaptation. Skyglow results from scattered artificial light in the atmosphere, distinct from glare or light trespass. Studies show sky brightness has been rising in many places (7–10% per year in some datasets), and while LEDs offer efficiency, rebound effects and blue-rich light can worsen the problem. Solutions call for targeted, downward-facing, low-level, warm-colored lighting with controls, recognizing that the Milky Way remains—it’s the brightened air between us and it that has changed.

via Space Daily|

#astronomy #led-lighting #light-pollution

space1 month ago•136 min saved

Hubble uncovers multi-age stars in the Milky Way’s chandelier cluster

A new Hubble image of NGC 6723 (the Chandelier Cluster) shows tens of thousands to millions of stars with blue, younger stars concentrated toward the center and orange, older stars toward the edges, indicating multiple stellar populations and a more complex formation history than once thought. Two star-formation epochs are implied, the second about 634 million years after the first, suggesting globular clusters may form from early gas clouds or be remnants of ancient dwarf galaxies. Globular clusters are common around large galaxies—Milky Way ~150, Andromeda ~460, M87 ~15,000.

via Live Science|

#globular-cluster #hubble-space-telescope #milky-way

space1 month ago•5 min saved

Rubin Observatory Detects Aquarius IV, a Faint Milky Way Satellite

Scientists using Rubin Observatory’s Early Data Preview 2 have announced Aquarius IV, an ultra-faint Milky Way satellite about 355,000 light-years away with an apparent magnitude of 18.3. The object was first spotted in Rubin data and later confirmed in archival images from the Dark Energy Camera, illustrating Rubin LSST’s potential to uncover many more faint satellites. Whether Aquarius IV is truly an ultra-faint dwarf galaxy or an unusually large globular cluster remains provisional, pending further spectroscopy and peer review.

via EarthSky|

#astronomy #dark-matter #dwarf-galaxies

astronomy1 month ago•4 min saved

Ancient Milky Way merger revealed by globular-cluster fossils

A Nature Astronomy study uses precise ages and metallicities of Milky Way globular clusters to reconstruct the Galaxy’s early growth, revealing three distinct age–metallicity tracks and an ancient major merger (progenitor Low-energy–Kraken–Heracles) about 12 billion years ago with roughly 500 million solar masses, depositing most material in the inner Milky Way. This refines the Milky Way’s formative timeline and complements JWST views of distant galaxies by tying together fossil stars and early-universe observations.

via The Conversation|

#astronomy #early-universe #gaia-sausage-enceladus

space1 month ago•43 min saved

AI unveils the Milky Way in a first-ever neutrino image

IceCube mapped the Milky Way with high-energy neutrinos over a decade, using deep learning to extract a faint galactic signal concentrated along the plane and toward the Galactic Center; the findings strongly indicate the Milky Way itself emits high-energy neutrinos, though no individual sources were pinpointed, and they pave the way for future IceCube upgrades and multimessenger studies.

via The Brighter Side of News|

#cosmic-rays #galactic-center #icecube-neutrino-observatory

science1 month ago•11 min saved

Naked-Eye Stars Aren’t Dead: Most Are Still Shining Within Reach

The common claim that the night sky is full of dead stars is mistaken: the stars visible without a telescope lie within roughly 4,000–10,000 light-years and have lifetimes from millions to trillions of years, so the light we see is a snapshot of their past rather than evidence of their demise. Because the naked-eye sample is nearby and long-lived, only about one visible star is expected to die every ~10,000 years as a rough Milky Way estimate, far slower than stellar lifespans. Exceptions exist (e.g., Earendel at great distance and Betelgeuse, which is not due to explode for ~100,000 years), but for ordinary observers the sky remains largely “alive.”

via Space Daily|

#betelgeuse #light-travel-time #milky-way

science1 month ago•13 min saved

Milky Way may host trillions of rogue planets, far outnumbering stars

NASA's nine-year microlensing study suggests about 20 planetary-mass objects per star—free-floating or in very wide orbits—potentially placing the Milky Way in the trillions of rogue planets, though the figure is model-based with broad uncertainty and not a direct census. The results favor many low-mass wanderers rather than giants, and future observations with the Roman Space Telescope are expected to sharpen the census and mass distribution.

via Space Daily|

#microlensing #milky-way #moa

space2 months ago•4 min saved

Mechanical Tracker Makes Pettit's Milky Way Shot Look Unreal

Astronaut Don Pettit's Milky Way image from the ISS drew skepticism about its realism, but he explained it was captured using a mechanical sidereal tracker on the Cupola to cancel the ISS's motion, turning stars into fixed points; the device, built by RIT, was later returned to the university.

via petapixel.com|

#cupola #don-pettit #iss

science2 months ago•2 min saved

Milky Way Hosts a Proton PeVatron Far More Energetic Than the LHC

Astronomers have identified LHAASO J1912+1014u as a proton PeVatron in the Milky Way, accelerating protons to PeV energies—well beyond the Large Hadron Collider—based on multiwavelength data from Fermi-LAT, FUGIN, and Chandra that rule out electrons as the gamma-ray source; the exact engine remains unknown, but such galactic PeVatrons may be common and help explain the origin of the most energetic cosmic rays.

via Gizmodo|

#cosmic-rays #gamma-rays #lhaaso-j19121014u