Faintest known star system orbiting the Milky Way discovered

A team of astronomers led by the University of Victoria and Yale University has detected an ancient star system traveling around our galaxy named Ursa Major III / UNIONS 1 (UMa3/U1)—the faintest and lowest-mass Milky Way ...

ALMA finds new molecular signposts in starburst galaxy

The ALMA radio telescope has detected more than 100 molecular species, including many indicative of different star formation and evolution processes, in a galaxy where stars are forming much more actively than in the Milky ...

The stunning echo of 800-year-old explosion

In the year 1181 a rare supernova explosion appeared in the night sky, staying visible for 185 consecutive days. Historical records show that the supernova looked like a temporary "star" in the constellation Cassiopeia shining ...

The most complete portrait of a supernova ever

Accounts of supernovae—exploding stars—go back thousands of years, and while we know today these events create the building blocks of life itself, there are still unanswered questions about the conditions that cause a ...

Gaia unravels the ancient threads of the Milky Way

ESA's Gaia space telescope has further disentangled the history of our galaxy, discovering two surprising streams of stars that formed and wove together more than 12 billion years ago.

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Milky Way

The Milky Way, or simply the Galaxy, is the galaxy in which the Solar System is located. It is a barred spiral galaxy that is part of the Local Group of galaxies. It is one of billions of galaxies in the observable universe.

Its name is a translation of the Latin Via Lactea, in turn translated from the Greek Γαλαξίας (Galaxias), referring to the pale band of light formed by the galactic plane as seen from Earth (see etymology of galaxy). Some sources hold that, strictly speaking, the term Milky Way should refer exclusively to the band of light that the galaxy forms in the night sky, while the galaxy should receive the full name Milky Way Galaxy, or alternatively the Galaxy. However, it is unclear how widespread this convention is, and the term Milky Way is routinely used in either context.

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