The image below
shows an incredible view of the core of our galaxy, i.e. Milky Way, seen from
the VISTA telescope from the European Space Agency. With the naked eye, you’d perhaps
see the center of the Milky Way—with countless stars and cosmic dust clouds—inhabiting
a small patch of a few inches.
Although, thanks to
the VISTA telescope we now have one of the most detail portraits of our galaxy,
i.e. Milky Way, EVER produced which has allowed astrophysicists to catalog a stunning
84 million stars. After seeing this image, ask yourself this... Are we really alone
in the Milky Way? The image shown above is just a small, condensed—thumbanil
version of the original image which has a mind-bending resolution of
108,500×81,500—or 9 gigapixels, occupying 24.6 gigabytes.
If you want to
download the 24.6-gigabyte image of Milky Way you can do so by clicking here.
Check out the ENTIRE 9-gigapixel image—and make sure to zoom in on those
stars—by clicking here. This image is just too big to be viewed at full
resolution and is best appreciated using the zoom tool.