The Milky Way

[valroadie]

This image is a portion of a new photo showing the central area of the Milky Way galaxy, released by astronomers at the European Southern Observatory's Paranal Observatory in Chile two weeks ago.

The photo shows 84 million stars in an image measuring 108,500×81,500, which contains nearly 9 billion pixels, and is actually a composite of thousands of individual photographs shot with the observatory's VISTA survey telescope.

See the full size, zoomable version here: http://bit.ly/TAFK3n

I thought I would share this with everyone, I love science and I would imagine some people here do too!

When zooming in, if you WAIT for it (because the pic is about 11mb big!) the picture will get VERY clear! So be patient ;)

[mips]

Billions and billions...

[valroadie]

And billions! Haha. It saddens me something so beautiful is out of physical reach! Haha.

[QIII]

The mind-boggling immensity of it makes yesterday's paper cut seem a bit insignificant.

It's not unreachable, by the way. Once, back in the 70s, I was going through New Mexico in the old 15 window Volkswagon bus. It broke down in the middle of nowhere. I walked a mile or two to an old man's hut. He kindly offered me dinner. For desert, he offered me a strange concoction he made from some sort of cactus or another. It was pretty bitter, but I didn't want to offend. Later, I flew right through the heart of the Milky Way. The stars and planets were spectacular and they shone in colors I had never imagined before.

[mips]

For desert, he offered me a strange concoction he made from some sort of cactus or another. It was pretty bitter, but I didn't want to offend. Later, I flew right through the heart of the Milky Way. The stars and planets were spectacular and they shone in colors I had never imagined before.

:biggrin:

[QIII]

Sheesh.

"Dessert" not "Desert".

[valroadie]

For dessert, he offered me a strange concoction he made from some sort of cactus or another. It was pretty bitter, but I didn't want to offend. Later, I flew right through the heart of the Milky Way. The stars and planets were spectacular and they shone in colors I had never imagined before.

:lol: Now that I think about it, I recall having something of this same nature. What a good night...remember to drink lots of water though! Haha.

[Jakin]

The Nebula's to the far right look interesting :D

Criminy! If i want the original- 25GB. tiff it is.

[QIII]

There was this other time when I flew through the galaxy. Back in '73. But I couldn't see much because the aliens were probing me in a compartment that had no port holes.

The VA still says they don't see the implant in XRays, but I know it's there. Why do they cover it up? The US government is working with the aliens!

;)

[Gremlinzzz]

The Milky Way is very mysterious.
The implant came from the strange concoction that's why the VA cant see it.
:popcorn:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qc0Mr6um3jA

[Erik1984]

Awesome! Really cool to smoothly scroll towards some of the big bright spots.