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Tag: Milky Way

  • The most accurate 3D map of stellar nurseries in the Milky Way

    The most accurate 3D map of stellar nurseries in the Milky Way

    Scientists created the most accurate three-dimensional map of star-formation regions in our Milky Way galaxy, based on data from the European Space Agency’s Gaia space telescope. This map will teach us more about these obscure cloudy areas, and the hot young stars that shape them.

    It is notoriously difficult to map and study regions in space where stars form because they are usually hidden from view by thick clouds of gas and dust, whose distances cannot be directly measured.

    Gaia can’t see these clouds directly, but it can measure stellar positions and the so-called ‘extinction’ of stars. This means it can see how much light from stars is blocked by dust. From this, scientists can create 3D maps showing where the dust is, and use those maps to figure out how much ionised hydrogen gas is present – a telltale sign of star formation.

    The new 3D map of star-forming regions in the Milky Way is based on Gaia observations of 44 million ‘ordinary’ stars and 87 O-type stars. The map extends to a distance of 4000 light-years from us, with the Sun at the centre.

    Read more: https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Gaia/Fly_through_Gaia_s_3D_map_of_stellar_nurseries

    Credit: European Space Agency (ESA)
    Animation: ESA/Gaia/DPAC, S. Payne-Wardenaar, L. McCallum et al (2025), CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
    Music:
    My Story – Echoes Of The Heart

    Access the video on the ESA video library: https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Videos/2025/09/The_most_accurate_3D_map_of_stellar_nurseries_in_the_Milky_Way

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  • Gaia: Rewriting the story of the Milky Way

    Gaia: Rewriting the story of the Milky Way

    For over a decade, ESA’s Gaia mission has mapped our galaxy with stunning precision—rewriting the story of the Milky Way. As its mission enters a new phase, we look back at its most groundbreaking discoveries.

    Credit: ESA – European Space Agency

    Chapters:
    00:23 – Mapping the Milky Way and beyond
    00:58 – Structure of the Milky Way
    01:40 – Galactic family tree
    02:27 – Mapping star-forming regions
    03:00 – Ancient star streams
    03:19 – Cosmic encounters
    04:07 – Black holes and hidden giants

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  • This is where we are in the Milky Way… 🌌

    This is where we are in the Milky Way… 🌌

    This stunning artist’s animation of the Milky Way is based on data from ESA’s Gaia space telescope. Gaia has completely reshaped our understanding of our home galaxy—revealing unexpected details about its spiral arms, central bar, and overall structure.

    We can’t take a selfie of the Milky Way, but thanks to Gaia, we’re seeing it clearer than ever! And with more data releases on the way, our view will only get sharper.

    Credit: ESA/Gaia/DPAC, Stefan Payne-Wardenaar

    #ESA #MilkyWay #Gaia

  • The best Milky Way animation, by Gaia

    The best Milky Way animation, by Gaia

    This is a new artist’s animation of our galaxy, the Milky Way, based on data from ESA’s Gaia space telescope.

    Gaia has changed our impression of the Milky Way. Even seemingly simple ideas about the nature of our galaxy’s central bar and the spiral arms have been overturned. Gaia has shown us that it has more than two spiral arms and that they are less prominent than we previously thought. In addition, Gaia has shown that its central bar is more inclined with respect to the Sun.
    No spacecraft can travel beyond our galaxy, so we can’t take a selfie, but Gaia is giving us the best insight yet of what our home galaxy looks like. Once all of Gaia’s observations collected over the past decade are made available in two upcoming data releases, we can expect an even sharper view of the Milky Way.

    Click here to download the still image of the Milky Way: https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Gaia/New_Gaia_release_reveals_rare_lenses_cluster_cores_and_unforeseen_science

    Credit: ESA/Gaia/DPAC, Stefan Payne-Wardenaar

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  • Gaia turns 10! 🚀 🎂

    Gaia turns 10! 🚀 🎂

    Ten years ago, on 19 December 2013, our billion star-mapping satellite Gaia launched.

    Since then, Gaia has been scanning the sky and gathering an enormous amount of data on the positions and motions of 1.8 billion stars, enabling discoveries about the history of our galaxy.

    Gaia is creating an extraordinarily precise three-dimensional map of more than a billion stars throughout our Milky Way galaxy and beyond, mapping their motions, luminosity, temperature and composition.

    This huge stellar census will provide the data needed to tackle an enormous range of important questions related to the origin, structure and evolutionary history of our galaxy.

    Gaia’s catalogue is ever-growing containing data on stars and other cosmic objects such as galaxies, exoplanets, and binary stars. Here’s to more discoveries!

    📹 ESA – European Space Agency

    #ESA #GaiaMission #SpaceExploration #Shorts

  • Starquakes are a thing and our Gaia mission has seen them #shorts

    Starquakes are a thing and our Gaia mission has seen them #shorts

    One of the surprising discoveries coming out of Gaia data release 3, is that Gaia is able to detect starquakes – tiny motions on the surface of a star – that change the shapes of stars, something the observatory was not originally built for.

    Previously, Gaia already found radial oscillations that cause stars to swell and shrink periodically, while keeping their spherical shape. But Gaia has now also spotted other vibrations that are more like large-scale tsunamis. These nonradial oscillations change the global shape of a star and are therefore harder to detect.

    Nonradial oscillation modes cause a star’s surface to move while it rotates, as shown in the animation. Dark patches are slightly cooler than bright patches, giving rise to periodic changes in the brightness of the star. The frequency of the rotating and pulsating stars was increased 8.6 million times to shift them into the audible range of humans.

    Learn more: https://bit.ly/GaiaDR3

    Credit: ESA/Gaia/DPAC, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO.
    Acknowledgement: Animation and sonification were created by: Dr. Joey Mombarg, KU Leuven, Belgium. Based on information from Gaia Data Release 3: Pulsations in main-sequence OBAF stars as observed by Gaia by the Gaia Collaboration, De Ridder et al., 2022, submitted to A&A. Van Reeth et al. 2015, ApJS 218, id.2, 32 pp. Mombarg et al. 2021, A&A 650, id.A58, 23 pp.

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  • Gaia data release 3: exploring our multi-dimensional Milky Way

    Gaia data release 3: exploring our multi-dimensional Milky Way

    Since its launch in 2013 ESA’s Gaia observatory has been mapping our galaxy from Lagrange point 2, creating the most accurate and complete multi-dimensional map of the Milky Way. By now two full sets of data have been released, the first set in 2016 and a second one in 2018. These data releases contained stellar positions, distances, motions across the sky, and colour information, among others. Now on 13 June 2022 a third and new full data set will be released. This data release will contain even more and improved information about almost 2 billion stars, Solar System objects and extragalactic sources. It also includes radial velocities for 33 million stars, a five-time increase compared to data release 2. Another novelty in this data set is the largest catalogue yet of binary stars in the Milky Way, which is crucial to understand stellar evolution.

    Learn more: https://bit.ly/GaiaDR3

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    We are Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out https://www.esa.int/ to get up to speed on everything space related.

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  • ESA highlights 2019

    ESA highlights 2019

    As the year comes to a close, it is once again time to look back and reflect on some of the achievements and highlights of European spaceflight. The new Gaia star catalogue and the launch of Cheops are keeping ESA at the forefront of space science, as will Solar Orbiter, being prepared for launch next year. The Copernicus programme continues to be the largest Earth observation programme in the world, with ESA preparing even more missions. On the Space Station, Luca Parmitano became the third European to command an ISS expedition. During his second mission, he made some of the space programme’s most complex and demanding spacewalks. At the end of 2019, the ESA Space19+ ministerial conference agreed to give ESA its largest budget ever and expressed continued support for Europe’s independent access to space with Ariane 6 and Vega-C.

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  • Gaia astronomical revolution

    Gaia astronomical revolution

    Launched in December 2013, the Gaia mission is revolutionising our understanding of the Milky Way. The space telescope is mapping our galaxy in unprecedented detail – measuring the position, movement and distance of stars.

    At a meeting in Groningen in the Netherlands, scientists have been discussing the challenge of processing and visualising Gaia data.

    Learn more about the Gaia mission: https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Gaia

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    We are Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out http://www.esa.int/ESA to get up to speed on everything space related.

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    #ESA
    #Space
    #GaiaMission

  • The Universe of Gaia

    The Universe of Gaia

    Launched in December 2013, ESA’s Gaia satellite has been scanning the sky to perform the most precise stellar census of our Milky Way galaxy, observing more than one billion stars and measuring their positions, distances and motions to unprecedented accuracy.

    The second Gaia data release, published in April, has provided scientists with extraordinary data to investigate the formation and evolution of stars in the Galaxy and beyond, giving rise to hundreds of scientific studies that are revolutionising our view of the cosmos.

    More info: http://bit.ly/GaiaScience

    Credits: ESA / CNES / Arianespace; ESA / Gaia / DPAC; Gaia Sky / S. Jordan / T. Sagristà; Koppelman, Villalobos and Helmi;
    Marchetti et al. 2018; NASA / ESA / Hubble; ESO, M. Kornmesser, L. Calçada

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    ESA is Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out http://www.esa.int/ESA to get up to speed on everything space related.

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  • Wormholes Explained – Breaking Spacetime

    Wormholes Explained – Breaking Spacetime

    To support Kurzgesagt and learn more about Brilliant, go to https://www.brilliant.org/nutshell and sign up for free. The first 688 people that go to that link will get 20% off the annual Premium subscription.

    Are wormholes real or are they just magic disguised as physics and maths? And if they are real how do they work and where can we find them?

    Sources and further reading:
    https://authors.library.caltech.edu/9262/1/MORprl88.pdf
    http://www.cmp.caltech.edu/refael/league/thorne-morris.pdf

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    Wormholes Explained – Breaking Spacetime

  • ESA Euronews: Gaia’s revolution in astronomy

    ESA Euronews: Gaia’s revolution in astronomy

    Astronomy is undergoing a revolution with the release of precision data on 1.7 billion stars in our galaxy from the Gaia space telescope. We head to the historic Observatory of Paris and ESA’s ESTEC base in the Netherlands to find out more.

    It’s fair to say that science has been waiting for centuries, or even millennia for such a detailed survey of the Milky Way, and right now star-gazers are swamped with fresh, high-quality data that they can use to answer every question about the galaxy they ever wanted to ask.

    This video is also available in the following languages:
    German: https://youtu.be/I7EHdEnXGi4
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    Hungarian: https://youtu.be/-PYmrCk1iwM

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    Learn more: http://bit.ly/GaiaRickestStarMap

  • Gaia second data release

    Gaia second data release

    The second data release of ESA’s Gaia mission has produced an extraordinary catalogue of over one and a half billion stars in our galaxy. Based on observations between July 2014 to May 2016, it includes the most accurate information yet on the positions, brightness, distance, motion, colour and temperature of stars in the Milky Way as well as information on asteroids and quasars.

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  • The Hyades cluster

    The Hyades cluster

    Animated 3D view of the sky as observed by ESA’s Gaia satellite using information from the mission’s second data release.

    The bright band in the left half of the image is the Milky Way, where most of the stars in our Galaxy reside. The animation starts with the Orion constellation at the centre; we then move towards the neighbouring Taurus constellation and to the Hyades star cluster, which is part of this constellation. Hyades is the closest open cluster to the Solar System, some 150 light-years away.

    The animation first shows the 3D structure of the cluster, based on accurate position and distance information from Gaia. Then an animated view of the future motions of stars is shown – both in Hyades and beyond. This is based on Gaia’s measurements of the velocity of stars across the sky, also known as proper motion.

    Credit: ESA/Gaia/DPAC, CC BY SA 3.0 IGO

    Acknowledgement: Gaia Data Processing and Analysis Consortium (DPAC); Gaia Sky; S. Jordan / T. Sagristà, Astronomisches Rechen-Institut, Zentrum für Astronomie der Universität Heidelberg, Germany

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  • Gaia’s first asteroid survey

    Gaia’s first asteroid survey

    Animated view of 14 099 asteroids in our Solar System, as viewed by ESA’s Gaia satellite using information from the mission’s second data release. The orbits of the 200 brightest asteroids are also shown, as determined using Gaia data.

    In future data releases, Gaia will also provide asteroid spectra and enable a complete characterisation of the asteroid belt. The combination of dynamical and physical information that is being collected by Gaia provides an unprecedented opportunity to improve our understanding of the origin and the evolution of the Solar System.

    Credit: ESA/Gaia/DPAC, CC BY SA 3.0 IGO

    Acknowledgement: Gaia Data Processing and Analysis Consortium (DPAC); Orbits: Gaia Coordinating Unit 4; P. Tanga, Observatoire de la Côte d’Azur, France; F. Spoto, IMCCE, Observatoire de Paris, France; Animation: Gaia Sky; S. Jordan / T. Sagristà, Astronomisches Rechen-Institut, Zentrum für Astronomie der Universität Heidelberg, Germany

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  • 360º Parallax and proper motion on the sky

    360º Parallax and proper motion on the sky

    A 360° animated view of the entire sky on 25 April 2018.

    After a few seconds, the stars start moving in the sky according to parallax, an apparent shift caused by Earth’s yearly motion around the Sun. Then, constellation outlines appear as visual aids. Finally, stars start moving according to their true motion through space, which is visible on the sky as proper motion. Parallaxes have been exaggerated by 100 000 and proper motions have been speeded up by one trillion (10^12) to make them visible in this animation. This animation is based on data from the second data release of ESA’s Gaia satellite, which has measured the positions, parallaxes and motions of more than one billion stars across the sky to unprecedented accuracy.

    ESA/Gaia/DPAC, CC BY SA 3.0 IGO

    Acknowledgement: Gaia Data Processing and Analysis Consortium (DPAC); Gaia Sky; S. Jordan / T. Sagristà, Astronomisches Rechen-Institut, Zentrum für Astronomie der Universität Heidelberg, Germany

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  • Waiting for Gaia

    Waiting for Gaia

    On 25 April 2018, ESA’s Gaia mission will publish its much awaited second data release, including high-precision measurements of nearly 1.7 billion stars in our Galaxy.

    Scientists who have been working on creating and validating the data contained in the catalogue tell us why they are waiting for this extraordinary release.

    Featured in the video: Antonella Vallenari (INAF, Astronomical Observatory of Padua), Anthony Brown (Leiden University), Timo Prusti (European Space Agency), Annie Robin (Institut UTINAM, OSU THETA Franche-Comté-Bourgogne), Laurent Eyer (University of Geneva) and Federica Spoto (IMCCE, Observatory of Paris).

    A media briefing on the second Gaia data release will be held at the ILA Berlin Air and Space Show in Germany on 25 April 11:00-12:15 CEST. Watch the webstream at www.esa.int/live

    Learn more about Gaia: bit.ly/ESAsGaia

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  • The motion of two million stars

    The motion of two million stars

    This video reveals the changing face of our Galaxy, tracing the motion of two million stars five million years into the future using data from the Tycho-Gaia Astrometric Solution, one of the products of the first Gaia data release. This provides a preview of the stellar motions that will be revealed in Gaia’s future data releases, which will enable scientists to investigate the formation history of our Galaxy.

    The stars are plotted in Galactic coordinates and using a rectangular projection: in this, the plane of the Milky Way stands out as the horizontal band with greater density of stars.

    The video starts from the positions of stars as measured by Gaia between 2014 and 2015, and shows how these positions are expected to evolve. The frames in the video are separated by 750 years, and the overall sequence covers five million years. The stripes visible in the early frames reflect the way Gaia scans the sky and the preliminary nature of the first data release; these artefacts are gradually washed out in the video as stars move across the sky.

    The shape of the Orion constellation can be spotted towards the right edge of the frame, just below the Galactic Plane, at the beginning of the video. As the sequence proceeds, the familiar shape of this constellation (and others) evolves into a new pattern. Two stellar clusters – groups of stars that were born together and consequently move together – can be seen towards the left edge of the frame: these are the alpha Persei (Per OB3) and Pleiades open clusters.

    More about this video:
    http://sci.esa.int/gaia/59004-two-million-stars-on-the-move/

    Credit: ESA/Gaia/DPAC CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/igo/

  • Press Conference: First Data Release from ESA’s Gaia Mission

    Press Conference: First Data Release from ESA’s Gaia Mission

    Launched in December 2013, Gaia is destined to create the most accurate map yet of the Milky Way. By making accurate measurements of the positions and motions of stars in the Milky Way, it will answer questions about the origin and evolution of our home galaxy.

    The first intermediate data release, containing among other things three-dimensional positions and two-dimensional motions of a subset of two million stars, demonstrates that Gaia’s measurements are as precise as planned, paving the way to create the full map of one billion stars to be released towards the end of 2017.

  • From the Solar System to the Hyades cluster

    From the Solar System to the Hyades cluster

    A virtual journey, from our Solar System through the Milky Way, based on data from the first release of ESA’s Gaia satellite.

    The journey starts by looking back at the Sun, surrounded by its eight planets. We then move away from the Sun and travel towards and around the Hyades star cluster, the closest open cluster to the Solar System, some 150 light-years away.

    The 3D positions of the stars shown in the animation are drawn from the Tycho-Gaia Astrometric Solution (TGAS), which combines information from Gaia’s first year of observations with the earlier Hipparcos and Tycho-2 Catalogues, both based on data from ESA’s Hipparcos mission.

    This new dataset contains positions on the sky, distances and proper motions of over two million stars. It is twice as precise and contains almost 20 times as many stars as the previous reference for astrometry, the Hipparcos Catalogue.

    The journey continues showing the full extent size of the stars contained in the Tycho-Gaia Astrometric Solution, all relatively near to the Sun, in the overall context of our Milky Way galaxy.

    The final Gaia catalogue will contain the most detailed 3D map ever made of the Galaxy, charting a billion stars – about 1% of the Milky Way’s stellar content – to unprecedented accuracy.

    For more information about Gaia, visit: http://www.esa.int/gaia

    Credit: ESA/Gaia/DPAC; Acknowledgement: S. Jordan & T. Sagristà Sellés (Zentrum für Astronomie der Universität Heidelberg)

  • ScienceCasts: Alien Matter in the Solar System

    ScienceCasts: Alien Matter in the Solar System

    “Alien matter” detected by a NASA spacecraft orbiting Earth shows that the chemical make-up of our solar system differs from that of the surrounding galaxy. Researchers discuss the possible meaning of this mismatch in this week’s ScienceCast video.
    Visit http://science.nasa.gov/ for more.