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The Milky Way [c] is the galaxy that includes the Solar System, with the name describing the galaxy's appearance from Earth: a hazy band of light seen in the night sky formed from stars that cannot be individually distinguished by the naked eye.
Diagram of the Milky Way, with galactic features and the relative position of the Solar System labelled. The Solar System is located in the Milky Way, a barred spiral galaxy with a diameter of about 100,000 light-years containing more than 100 billion stars.
Orbit of the Solar System: 17,200 pc 5.31×10 17: 17.72: The average diameter of the orbit of the Solar System relative to the Galactic Center. The Sun's orbital radius is roughly 8,600 parsecs, or slightly over halfway to the galactic edge. One orbital period of the Solar System lasts between 225 and 250 million years. Milky Way Galaxy: 30,000 pc
Orion Arm. 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 10,000 light-years (3,100 parsecs) in length. [2] This galactic structure encompasses the Solar System, including Earth.
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. It uses the right-handed convention ...
Objects must orbit Earth within this radius, or they can become unbound by the gravitational perturbation of the Sun. Earth, along with the Solar System, is situated in the Milky Way and orbits about 28,000 light-years from its center. It is about 20 light-years above the galactic plane in the Orion Arm.
See also: Galaxy group, Galaxy cluster, List of galaxy groups and clusters The Laniakea Supercluster ( / ˌ l ɑː n i . ə ˈ k eɪ . ə / ; Hawaiian for "open skies" or "immense heaven") [2] or the Local Supercluster ( LSC or LS ) is the galaxy supercluster that is home to the Milky Way and approximately 100,000 other nearby galaxies.
Astronomers have released an image of the Milky Way that maps some of the largest structures in the galaxy, including nebulas and the galactic center. Gorgeous new Milky Way image maps our galaxy ...