Galactic Center of Milky Way
Also known as Center of Milky Way Galaxy, Milky Way Galactic Center, Milky Way Galaxy Center, Galactic Centre, Galactic Center, Galactic Centre of Milky Way
rotational center of the Milky Way galaxy
AI overview
The Galactic Center is the rotational center point of the Milky Way galaxy, located about 26,000 light-years from Earth in the direction of the constellation Sagittarius. It's important because understanding this central region helps scientists learn how galaxies are structured and function, including the role of the supermassive black hole believed to be at its core.
AI-generated from the Wikipedia summary — may contain errors.
Wikidata facts
- Distance from Earth
- 8
- Radius
- 1000
- Image
- Galactic Cntr full cropped.jpg
Show 6 more facts
- Commons category
- Galactic Center
- time of discovery or invention
- 1918-00-00
- right ascension
- 266.41500889
- declination
- -29.00611111
- galactic latitude
- 0
- galactic longitude
- 0
Sources (3)
~16 min read
Article
The Galactic Center, as seen by one of the 2MASS infrared telescopes, is located in the bright upper left portion of the image. Marked location of the Galactic Center A starchart of the night sky towards the Galactic Center
The Galactic Center is the barycenter of the Milky Way and a corresponding point on the rotational axis of the galaxy. Its central massive object is a supermassive black hole of about 4 million solar masses, which is called Sagittarius A*, part of which is a very compact radio source arising from a bright spot in the region around the black hole, near the event horizon. The Galactic Center is approximately 8 kiloparsecs (26,000 ly) away from Earth in the direction of the constellations Sagittarius, Ophiuchus, and Scorpius, where the Milky Way appears brightest, visually close to the Butterfly Cluster (M6) or the star Lambda Scorpii, south to the Pipe Nebula.