9-Billion-Pixel Photo of Milky Way’s Center Is Full of Stars

[morningfog]

Containing more than 84 million stars, this nine-gigapixel shot of the Milky Way’s central bulge will help astronomers unravel the complex history of star formation in our home galaxy.

The image was taken by the European Southern Observatory’s VISTA infrared survey telescope, and combined thousands of separate pictures to create this monumental work. The photo contains 10 times more stars than previous studies and will allow scientists to perform important statistical analyses of the color, temperature, mass, and ages of the different stars in the Milky Way.

Our galaxy, like most spiral galaxies, contains a central bulge that is filled with older stars that could help scientists better understand galactic evolution. But the bulge ”concentrate[s] not only most of the stars in the Milky Way, but also gas and dust,” wrote the authors of the new research in a paper appearing Oct. 24 in Astronomy & Astrophysics. All the gas and dust obscure the central stars, making observations difficult. By using infrared wavelengths, the team was able to bypass the gas and dust and build a vast new dataset of central Milky Way stars.

The image above is an insane 108,200 by 81,500 pixels. If printed at the standard photo resolution of a book, it would stretch 30 feet tall and 23 feet wide, easily able cover the side of a three-story building. You can download the entire 24.6 Gigabyte version, if you dare.

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/10/9-gigapixel-milky-way/

[Casandia]

1. Stunning!

Puts our little world and problemsin perspective, no? Not sure I will download the entire version....

[HappyMe]

2. k&r

Beautiful!

[reformist2]

3. My God,

[Javaman]

5. it's full of stars.nt

[Aristus]

8. You beat me to it!

First thing I thought of when I saw the title of the OP.

[snooper2]

10. didn't build that

[Berlum]

4. Precisely as predicted by the Mayan 2012 Long Count calendar

[Delphinus]

11. How cool!

Thanks for this!

[jsr]

6. And that's only 84 million out of 300 billion

they think there are in the Milky Way.

[HopeHoops]

7. The frightening thing is that 24.6 GB isn't that much on my server. But VIEWING IT!?!?!

[HopeHoops]

9. Don't bother to download it unless you have Adobe Photoshop - it's in PSB format.

I just started trying to download it. The current estimate is 11 days and 21 hours. This should be entertaining. Windows Update will probably bounce my server before that finishes, but it will still be fun to try.