Apr 26th, 2016: Spaghetti Nebula

[glatt]

So very many stars. I know there are a lot of stars. I've basically always known there are a lot of stars. But would you look at that? So many stars.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by glatt

So very many stars. I know there are a lot of stars. I've basically always known there are a lot of stars. But would you look at that? So many stars.

And that's only 3 degrees, so times 120, for just the stars we can see.

[Tanalia]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

And that's only 3 degrees, so times 120, for just the stars we can see.

120 would only cover a narrow strip circling around the sky; covering the full sphere would be about 4580 of these little 3x3 patches.

[Gravdigr]

Originally Posted by glatt

So very many stars. So many stars.

At least a dozen.

[Griff]

Call it a baker's dozen.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by glatt

So very many stars. I know there are a lot of stars. I've basically always known there are a lot of stars. But would you look at that? So many stars.

yeah, a lot...

This huge ball of stars predates our Sun. Long before humankind evolved, before dinosaurs roamed, and even before our Earth existed, ancient globs of stars condensed and orbited a young Milky Way Galaxy. Of the 200 or so globular clusters that survive today, Omega Centauri is the largest, containing over ten million stars. Omega Centauri is also the brightest globular cluster, at apparent visual magnitude 3.9 it is visible to southern observers with the unaided eye. Cataloged as NGC 5139, Omega Centauri is about 18,000 light-years away and 150 light-years in diameter. Unlike many other globular clusters, the stars in Omega Centauri show several different ages and trace chemical abundances, indicating that the globular star cluster has a complex history over its 12 billion year age.

[SPUCK]

Originally Posted by glatt

So very many stars. I know there are a lot of stars. I've basically always known there are a lot of stars. But would you look at that? So many stars.

Ah. Don't forget planets! They've come to the conclusion that there is at least one planet for every star you see and I suspect that will be greatly increased because that number is arrived at by looking at how many planets Kepler has seen as compared to the stars it monitors and it can only see large planets.

That means the Milky Way Galaxy (ours) has at least 400 million planets.

I'm picturing green slime aliens ooooozing along the surface of at least one of them.