Explanation: Ferdinand Magellan and his crew had plenty of time to study the southern sky during their famous voyage around the world. As a result, two fuzzy cloud-like objects, not visible to northern hemisphere dwellers, are now known as the Clouds of Magellan. These star clouds are small irregular galaxies, satellites of our larger Milky Way spiral galaxy. The Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) pictured above is only about 180,000 light-years distant - the only known galaxy closer is the Sagittarius Dwarf. Both the LMC and the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) are joined to the Milky Way by a stream of cold hydrogen gas. An unusual effect called gravitational lensing has recently been detected in a few LMC stars, and there is hope this could tell us important information about the true composition of our universe.
1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 |
Январь Февраль Март Апрель Май Июнь Июль Август Сентябрь Октябрь Ноябрь Декабрь |
NASA Web Site Statements, Warnings, and Disclaimers
NASA Official: Jay Norris. Specific rights apply.
A service of: LHEA at NASA / GSFC
& Michigan Tech. U.
Публикации с ключевыми словами:
Local Group of Galaxies - irregular galaxy - Магеллановы Облака - Неправильная галактика - гравитационное линзирование - Большое Магелланово Облако
Публикации со словами: Local Group of Galaxies - irregular galaxy - Магеллановы Облака - Неправильная галактика - гравитационное линзирование - Большое Магелланово Облако | |
См. также:
Все публикации на ту же тему >> |