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The most accurate 3D map of our Milky Way galaxy has been revealed by astronomers.
The 3D map of the Milky Way was created using data from the European Space Agency’s Gaia spacecraft that has been scanning stars since 2013.
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The hope is that the map sheds new light on the functioning of the galaxy we call home.
It allows astronomers to measure acceleration and hopefully find out how much the universe has expanded since the dawn of time.
There are 1.8 billion stars on the map.
ESA has unveiled the map and uploaded a fascinating YouTube video of how the stars move in the Milky Way.
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ESA said: “The new data from Gaia has allowed astronomers to track various populations of older and younger stars towards the edge of our galaxy – the galactic anticenter.
“Computer models have predicted that the Milky Way disk will get bigger over time with the birth of new stars.
“The new data allows us to see the relics of the ancient 10 billion-year-old disk and thus determine its smaller extent than the current size of the Milky Way disk.”
The new 3D map was revealed just as another group of researchers claimed that Earth is closer to the black hole at the center of our galaxy than previously thought.
The Milky Way has a huge black hole in the center called Sagittarius A *.
Astronomers from the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan used their data collected over 15 years to create another map of the Milky Way.
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They estimated the position of the Earth relative to the black hole at the center of the Milky Way.
In 1985, Earth was thought to be 27,700 light-years away from Sagittarius A *.
The new map places it 25,800 light years away.
Scientists think the Earth would be destroyed inside a black hole, but there’s no need to panic yet.
25,800 light-years away is a huge distance, so Earth will nowhere be near Sagittarius A * for a long time.
A light year runs at about six trillion miles.
Facts about the Milky Way
Here are some things you may not know about our galaxy …
- The Milky Way is almost as old as the Universe itself, with recent estimates suggesting the Universe is about 13.7 or 13.8 billion years old and the Milky Way is about 13.6 billion years old.
- the Milky Way is disc-shaped and measures approximately 120,000 light-years in diameter
- It has a supermassive black hole in the middle called Sagittarius A *
- Contains over 200 billion stars
- It is thought to have an invisible halo made of dark matter
STARRY EYES
Rare “Christmas Star” that forms in the sky when Jupiter and Saturn appear together
OUTSIDE THIS WORLD
Scientists unveil blueprints for city on Mars hosting 1 million people on CLIFFS
GOING … GONE
The drone footage shows the space telescope featured in Bond’s GoldenEye COLLAPSE
FLY THE FLAG
China mocks the West by flying its flag on the moon as the space race with the United States heats up
NIGHT LIGHTS
Mysterious “spectral circles” looming in space: they could be WORMHOLES
In other space news, strange ghostly circles spotted in space baffle astronomers as they try to figure out what they might be.
This year’s largest meteor shower will peak next week.
And NASA hopes to go back in time using the James Webb Space Telescope.
Are you impressed with the Milky Way map? Let us know in the comments …
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