ESA’s Gaia space telescope detects stellar wave in the Milky Way

We already cognize that the stars of the Milky Way orbit its center, and Gaia has measured their speeds and movements with unprecedented accuracy. The scope besides discovered that the Galactic disk wobbles implicit time, overmuch similar a spinning top. Overall, Gaia — which ceased operations past March — has fixed america the largest and astir precise multidimensional representation of our galaxy.

Now, a caller investigation of Gaia’s information provides caller insight: a monolithic question is shifting stars tens of thousands of light-years from the Sun. According to ESA’s announcement, this galactic question resembles the ripples spreading outward erstwhile a chromatic is thrown into a lake.

The maps created with Gaia’s information amusement the question stretching crossed a immense portion of the Galactic disk, influencing stars located betwixt 30,000 and 65,000 light-years from the Galactic center.

Researchers identified this question by studying the precise positions and movements of young elephantine stars and Cepheids — a benignant of adaptable prima utilized arsenic cardinal markers for measuring galactic and extragalactic distances. As these stars determination with the wave, scientists judge that state successful the Galactic disk whitethorn besides beryllium caught successful this ripple-like flow.

The origins of these galactic oscillations stay unknown. One imaginable mentation could beryllium an past collision with a dwarf galaxy, though this requires further investigation. The monolithic question mightiness besides beryllium linked to a smaller-scale ripple observed astir 500 light-years from the Sun, successful a antithetic portion of the Galactic disk, known arsenic the Radcliffe Wave.

The findings were published successful the diary Astronomy and Astrophysics.