Journey to the Center of the Galaxy


What lies at the center of our galaxy? In Jules Verne’s classic science fiction novel, A Journey to the Center of the Earth, Professor Liedenbrock and his fellow explorers encounter many strange and exciting wonders. Astronomers are already aware of some of the bizarre objects that exist at our Galactic Center, including vast cosmic dust clouds, bright star clusters, swirling gas rings, and even a supermassive black hole. Much of the Galactic Center is hidden from our view in visible light by intervening dust and gas, but it can be explored using other forms of electromagnetic radiation. The featured video is actually a digital zoom into the center of the Milky Way, beginning with visible-light images from the Digitized Sky Survey. As the movie progresses, the light shown shifts to dust-penetrating infrared, highlighting gas clouds recently discovered in 2013 that are falling toward the central black hole.

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