Скачать или смотреть Gaia's Billion Star Map: Cosmic Census!

The ESA's Gaia mission, launched in 2013, is creating the most detailed 3D map of the Milky Way. By precisely measuring the positions and movements of over a billion stars, Gaia is revolutionizing our understanding of galactic structure and evolution. It's a cosmic census on an unprecedented scale!

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Imagine peering into the heart of the Milky Way, a swirling vortex of light and dust. Billions of stars, each a sun in its own right, stretching across unimaginable distances. This isn't just a pretty picture; it's a living map being created, one tiny measurement at a time, by a tireless explorer.

Meet Gaia, the European Space Agency's audacious mission. Launched in 2013, it's orbiting a million miles from Earth, meticulously scanning the sky. Its goal? To chart the precise positions, distances, and movements of over a billion stars. It's the ultimate stellar family tree!

Gaia uses astrometry, the science of measuring stellar positions with incredible accuracy. Think of it as galactic GPS. By observing each star dozens of times over years, Gaia can detect minuscule shifts, even smaller than the width of a human hair seen from a thousand kilometers away.

Boom! Gaia reveals that our galaxy isn't the serene spiral we thought. It has ripples, distortions, and evidence of past collisions. We now know that the Milky Way merged with the dwarf galaxy Gaia-Enceladus over 8 billion years ago, adding to the Milky Way's stellar population!

Gaia's data is a goldmine for astronomers. It's helping us understand stellar evolution, discover exoplanets, and even test Einstein's theory of general relativity with unprecedented precision. This cosmic census will reshape our understanding of the universe for generations to come. The data is available for everyone!

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