Search results
Results From The WOW.Com Content Network
The Milky Way [c] is the galaxy that includes the Solar System, ... with the galactic longitude increasing in the counter-clockwise direction ...
The Solar System traces out a sinusoidal path in its orbit around the galactic center. Using Galactic North as the initial frame of reference, the Earth and Sun rotate counterclockwise, and the Earth revolves in a counterclockwise direction around the Sun. However, the Sun and its satellites revolve CLOCKWISE around the Milky Way.
The galactic coordinate system is a celestial coordinate system in spherical coordinates, with the Sun as its center, the primary direction aligned with the approximate center of the Milky Way Galaxy, and the fundamental plane parallel to an approximation of the galactic plane but offset to its north.
The Milky Way's outer halo has many globular clusters with a retrograde orbit [38] and with a retrograde or zero rotation. [39] The structure of the halo is the topic of an ongoing debate. Several studies have claimed to find a halo consisting of two distinct components.
Figure 1.The observed structure of the Milky Way's spiral arms [1]. The Orion Arm, also known as the Orion–Cygnus Arm, is a minor spiral arm within the Milky Way Galaxy spanning 3,500 light-years (1,100 parsecs) in width and extending roughly 20,000 light-years (6,100 parsecs) in length. [2]
In 1959, the IAU defined the position of the Milky Way's north galactic pole as exactly RA = 12 h 49 m, Dec = 27° 24′ in the then-used B1950 epoch; [citation needed] in the currently-used J2000 epoch, after precession is taken into account, its position is RA 12 h 51 m 26.282 s, Dec 27° 07′ 42.01″.
The galactic year, also known as a cosmic year, is the duration of time required for the Sun to orbit once around the center of the Milky Way Galaxy. [1] One galactic year is approximately 225 million Earth years. [2]
Sagittarius A (Sgr A) is a complex radio source at the center of the Milky Way, which contains a supermassive black hole.It is located between Scorpius and Sagittarius, and is hidden from view at optical wavelengths by large clouds of cosmic dust in the spiral arms of the Milky Way.