The universe near us

universe-near-135x100Click on the image to see a larger map of the nearby universe, with us at the center.

As described by Gregg Easterbrook: “The map contains about 100,000 dots. The dots are not stars; each dot represents a galaxy, and galaxies are thought to average about 100 billion stars each. Thus the area depicted contains holds roughly 10 to the 15th power stars, a number far too huge to bother attempting to fathom. And the map merely shows galaxies nearby.”

Awesome.

More images here, created by Chris Fluke of the Centre for Astrophysics & Supercomputing at Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne, Australia.

4 thoughts on “The universe near us”

  1. James R Slabonik

    The image referenced represents 100, 000 galaxies. The observable universe is estimated to contain 200 billion to 2 trillion galaxies. Galaxy- Wikipedia.

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