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Image Gallery
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PJM's Astronomy Gallery
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The Sun and hence our Solar System is a member of Our Galaxy, also called the Milky Way. It is a huge spiral shaped star system (see
Galaxies) consisting of at least 100,000 million stars, some of which may support Earth-like planets. Our Galaxy is composed of a central bulge, disk and halo similar to the Andromeda Galaxy below. The disk is populated with younger stars compared to the central bulge, and these stars are often packed together in Open Clusters as exemplified by M45. (Click here for M38 in
Auriga).
The disk is almost 100,000 light years in diameter with our Sun about two thirds
distant from the (Sagittarius located) central bulge.
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M45. The Pleiades in Taurus exemplifies an Open Cluster. 55mm Super-Takumar lens with LPR and IR filters. Note the blue nebulosity of the Pleiades stars. Exposure R:G:B:L of 2:4:1:2 min. on 1 Jan. 2002. Image size: 5 by 3.8 deg. Click on image for full scale.
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The halo is a spherical volume of stars surrounding the central bulge. These stars are very old and exist in the form of Globular Clusters, which can contain many thousands of stars, some having high central condensation, while others are more resolvable.
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M13 Globular Cluster in Hercules. 2 min. exposure at prime focus with 200mm Schmidt-Newtonian on 4 Aug. 1998. No filters. Field of view is 9 by 9 arcmin.
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M56 Globular Cluster in Lyra. 3 min. exposure at prime focus with 200mm Schmidt-Newtonian on 19 Oct. 2000. Field of view is 9 by 9 arcmin.
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M92 Globular Cluster in Hercules. 2 min. exposure at prime focus with 200mm Schmidt-Newtonian on 23 Aug. 2000. Field of view is 9 by 9 arcmin.
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Click here to see more of my Globular Cluster images in full size.
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Interstellar dust restricts the range at which stars can be seen across Our Galaxy. However, we are able to view along the plane of the disk in some areas, and evidence the huge density of stars in some of the spiral arms. The large density of stars we also term the Milky Way. The edge of the Milky Way against the background Universe or interstellar dust makes for a sharp contrast in the density of stars. The star Altair (alpha Aquila) is located at the edge of an arm of the Milky Way.
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At the edge of the Milky Way. The star density of the Milky Way is evident to the right of Altair, the bright star left of centre of the image.
Altair in Aquila imaged with a 55 mm Super-Takumar lens with LP AND IR filters on 27 Aug. 2001. Exposure time of 8 min. Field of view is 5 by 3.8 deg.
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Lying close to Our Galaxy are two dwarf irregular galaxies, the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds, visible in our Southern hemisphere, which are satellites of Our Galaxy. Our nearest neighbour galaxy is Andromeda at a distance of 2.2 million light years, and is of spiral shape similar to Our Galaxy, but twice as large. Andromeda is closing fast with Our Galaxy and one scenario predicts it to collide and merge to form an elliptical galaxy... albeit in 3 billion years!
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Andromeda (M31) our nearest neighbour galaxy at 2.2 million light years. Imaged with a 55 mm Super-Takumar lens using LP and IR filters on 27 Dec. 2000. Exposure time is 15 min. Field of view: 5 by 3.8 deg.
At 2.2 million light years, this image pictures, not the present state, but the state of the galaxy when man was still ape-like on Earth.
Note the small, nebulous galaxy M110 to the lower, middle left of Andromeda. The numerous stars are in Our Galaxy between us and the Andromeda Galaxy. The image is left to right and inverted with respect to actual orientation. Click here for Luminance image of M31.
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More Milky Way Information?
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