Our galaxy, the Milky Way, is a spiral galaxy. Viewed from above, it looks like a giant Danish pastry with swirls of white icing. From the side, it looks more like two fried eggs stuck back-to-back!
Amazing! Our galaxy has a twin. Andromeda is the biggest galaxy near the Milky Way. It’s the same age and a similar shape, but has many more stars.
What’s at the middle of the Milky Way?
The centre (the two ‘egg yolks’) is called the nuclear bulge. There’s probably a monster black hole there, more than a million times bigger than our Sun. Scientists call the black hole Sagittarius A*.
How big is the Milky Way?
The Milky Way is almost too big to imagine. It would take the world’s fastest jet, the Blackbird, about 30 billion years to cross the galaxy.
Is it true? We’re near the centre of the Milky Way.
No. Our Solar System is closer to the edge, on one of the spiralling arms. Our Sun takes 225 million years to go around the centre once!
Picture Credit : Google