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Credit & Copyright: Axel Mellinger
Explanation:
This quite stunning panorama
of the entire sky is a mosaic of 51
wide-angle
photographs.
Made over a three year period from locations in
California (USA), South Africa, and Germany, the individual
pictures were
digitized and stitched together to create
an apparently seamless 360 by 180 degree view.
Using a mathematical prescription like one often
used to map
the whole Earth's surface onto a single flat image,
the complete digital mosaic was distorted and
projected onto an oval shape.
The image is oriented so the
plane of our Milky Way Galaxy
runs horizontally
through the middle with the
Galactic center at image center and
Galactic north at the top.
Most striking are the "milky"
bands of starlight from the
multitude of
stars in
the
galactic plane cut by the dark, obscuring dust clouds
strewn through the local spiral arms.
In fact, almost everything visible here is within our own
Milky Way Galaxy.
Two fuzzy patches in the lower right quadrant of the mosaic
do correspond to external galaxies, though.
Known as the
Magellanic
Clouds, these are small, nearby satellite
galaxies of the magnificent Milky Way.
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NASA Web Site Statements, Warnings, and Disclaimers
NASA Official: Jay Norris. Specific rights apply.
A service of: LHEA at NASA / GSFC
& Michigan Tech. U.
Based on Astronomy Picture
Of the Day
Publications with keywords: all sky - galactic plane - Milky Way
Publications with words: all sky - galactic plane - Milky Way
See also:
- APOD: 2025 February 9 Á Milky Way over the Australian Pinnacles
- APOD: 2024 November 24 Á Journey to the Center of the Galaxy
- APOD: 2024 November 5 Á Milky Way over Easter Island
- APOD: 2024 August 4 Á Gaia: Here Comes the Sun
- APOD: 2024 July 29 Á Milky Way over Uluru
- APOD: 2024 May 29 Á Stairway to the Milky Way
- APOD: 2023 December 12 Á Aurora and Milky Way over Norway