Our Location in the Milky Way

Okay were exactly are we located in the Galaxy of ours? And could some one post up a picture im more of a visual person, thanks

Hi SpockO_0

A search of the internet would answer your question: entering "Milky Way Galaxy" provided this link, although there were many more.

To quote from this work:

"Our solar system is thus situated within the outer regions of this galaxy, well within the disk and only about 20 light years above the equatorial symmetry plane but about 28,000 light years from the Galactic Center. Therefore, the Milky Way shows up as luminous band spanning all around the sky along this symmetry plane, which is also called the "Galactic Equator". Its center lies in the direction of the constellation Sagittarius, but very close to the border of both neighbor constellations Scorpius and Ophiuchus. The distance of 28,000 light years has recently (1997) been confirmed by the data of ESA's astrometric satellite Hipparcos. Other investigations published consequently have disputed this value and propose a smaller value of some 25,000 light years, based on stellar dynamics; a recent investigation (McNamara et.al 2000, based on RR Lyrae variables) yields roughly 26,000 light years. These data, if of significance, wouldn't immediately effect values for distances of particular objects in the Milky Way or beyond.

The solar system is situated within a smaller spiral arm, called the Local or Orion Arm, which is merely connection between the inner and outer next more massive arms, the Sagittarius Arm and the Perseus Arm; see our Milky Way Spiral Structure page."

I hope that helps?

The way i look at it, does anyone know where we are in the milky way galaxy? ITs like soo huge, how would anyone know. but i guess for the aliens that travel through space tryin to locate earth....

Just look up on a clear night away from city lights and see if you can't imagine our place in the universe. The Milky Way is unmistakenable and with a little imagination or place in the order is obvious.

Made it myself. We are 2/3rds the way out from the gallactic center.

Now if you ever get lost you can stop off and ask for directions.

Yes.


Uhm, yea, ok.

OMG 200 Billion stars?? That is just huge, and to think we can't even travel to ANY of them yet, not a one, nope.

thats exactly why theres a very good god damn chance aliens exsists.
200 billion stars, thats only our galaxy, imagine the countless other galaxy that we'll never reach..

a java applet which starts you at 10 million light years from the Earth, and zooms in by powers of ten until you reach the subatomic universe of electrons and protons.

micro.magnet.fsu.edu...

Celestia is better:

Celestia is a free real-time space simulation that lets you experience our universe in three dimensions. Unlike most planetarium software, Celestia doesn't confine you to the surface of the Earth. You can travel throughout the solar system, to any of over 100,000 stars, or even beyond the galaxy.
shatters.net...

Both are Brilliant and highly recommended. Celestia can take up a lot more hours of exploration, but the powers of 10 applet is definitely worth a look, its awe inspiring.

Maybe if I cryo freeze my self I will be able to see another planet...

I thought that our Sun was located a lot closer to the outer edge than that...

external image



www.ecology.com...

Yup, in fact there's estimately 100 billion galaxies in our universe, some of which are super-galaxies containing 10 times or more stars than our own galaxy. Chew on that. But don't think about it for too long, it might boggle your mind 'til you get mad

When you look at a dark sky, on a clear, moonless night; all the stars in the sky number perhaps 5000 stars at any given time. This is about the number of grains of sand in a small handful of sand. But, the number of stars in the visible universe is greater than the number of all the grains of sand on all the beaches on the face of the planet Earth.

The family of stars in which our Sun belongs is the Milky Way galaxy. The number of stars in our galaxy alone is equal to about the number of grains of sand in two large dump trucks. There are perhaps 100 billion galaxies in our universe.

We are talking about stars (suns); now consider how many planets must be among the planetary bodies.