Milky Way , belongs to the larger local galaxy group . In the local galaxy group , the Milky Way and the Andromeda Galaxy are the two largest galaxies. In addition to the two major galaxies, there are many small galaxies. Scientists have discovered that two small galaxies are hurtling towards the Milky Way and will collide with it in billions of years.
But we don’t have to worry about this, because it will happen in the very distant future, and the Milky Way is larger, and the collision of small galaxies will not have a big impact.
So how big is the Milky Way? Where are our Earth and Sun located in the Milky Way?
The diameter of the Milky Way is at least 200,000 light-years. The Earth is located in the "suburban" of the Milky Way. Due to its relatively remote location, it is difficult for people to directly see the full picture and true face of the Milky Way.
But this does not trouble astronomers. Using super powerful radio telescopes and optical astronomy, humans can obtain a lot of information about the Milky Way.
Now we know that the vast Milky Way contains four main spiral arms , spreading out from the center of the Milky Way, just like the bustling urban streets extending to the suburbs.
The four main cantilevers are: Centaur arm, Southern Cross arm, Perseus arm and Sagittarius arm, and our earth is located between the Perseus arm and Sagittarius arm. The Orion arm.
Scientists predict that the Milky Way has at least 200 billion stars, each star is constantly moving, and each star has its own star system .
The sun is about 26,000 light-years away from the center of the Milky Way, a very far distance. It takes about 225 million years to orbit the Milky Way, which is also one galactic year.
The Milky Way as a whole has a spiral shape, also known as a "dense waveform". Each spiral structure has dense stars and gas clouds .
The stars in the center of the Milky Way are most densely distributed. They all orbit the supermassive black hole in the center of the Milky Way at very fast speeds. During the rapid movement, the orbits of the stars will shift due to the gravitational force and then collide. Some unlucky stars will be completely swallowed by supermassive black holes.
Since the stars in the center of the Milky Way are very densely distributed, this is why although there is a supermassive black hole in the center of the Milky Way, which should be pitch black, due to the large number of dense stars around it and the high-energy cosmic rays produced by the process of stars being swallowed by the black hole, This makes the center of the Milky Way appear very bright.
The universe is filled with dust and gas cloud molecules, which also blocks humans' view of the universe. But essentially everything is the product of dust and gas cloud molecules, because the original stars were formed by the gravity of dust and gas cloud molecules, and our sun is no exception!
