Showing posts with label Milky way galaxy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Milky way galaxy. Show all posts

Monday, January 16, 2012

Milky Way galaxy is colored white

The science has just started discovering things about our galaxy and we are yet to answer the really big questions such as is there another life hidden somewhere in our galaxy. In the meantime science is determining different other interesting things and one of these things is also the color of our Milky Way galaxy.

At the 219th American Astronomical society meeting the astronomers have announced that our galaxy has white color and they compared it with "spring snow at an hour after sunrise or before sunset."

This white color refers to the color of our galaxy by looking outside and you may rightly ask yourself how did the scientists determine the color of our galaxy? This was done by comparing star types in other galaxies.

Why is important to determine the color of galaxy? The astronomers say that color can reveal various other interesting information about galaxy, for instance how old are the stars in the galaxy.

Professor Jeffrey Newman of the University of Pittsburgh said that they gathered data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, which included information about million other galaxies. By comparing this info with the things they already knew about the total mass in the Milky Way, the rate of star formation, the researchers were able to find near matches among other galaxies and eventually determined a precise measure of what color it must be.

The astronomers also announced that our Milky Way galaxy is not a cosmic rookie but still has a long way to go before entering the last year of its life.

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Friday, October 2, 2009

Milky Way galaxy facts


Milky way is the name of galaxy in which our solar system is located.

Milky way is only one of the billions of other galaxies in the observable universe.

Milky way galaxy contains of more than 200 billions stars.

Diameter of our galaxy is approximately 100,000 light years.

The Milky Way galaxy looks the brightest when viewed in the direction of the constellation of Sagittarius, towards the center of galaxy.

The largest neighboring galaxy to Milky Way is Andromeda galaxy.

The oldest star in Milky way galaxy is 13,2 billion years old, almost as old as the Universe itself.

One galactic year is time needed for solar system to complete one orbit around the galaxy, in our case we are talking about 225–250 million years.

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