Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/Milky Way Galaxy

 
The center of our Milky Way Galaxy is located in the constellation of Sagittarius. In visible light the lion's share of stars are hidden behind thick clouds of dust. This obscuring dust becomes increasingly transparent at infrared wavelengths. This central core, seen in the upper left portion of the image, is about 25,000 light years away and is thought to harbor a supermassive black hole. The reddening of the stars here and along the Galactic Plane is due to scattering by the dust; it is the same process by which the sun appears to redden as it sets. The 2MASS analysis software has identified and measured the properties of almost 10 million stars in this spectacular field alone.
 
Edit Removed gray border.
 
High Res Version
Reason
It is a beautiful image with ~ 10 million stars and fantastic example of the center of our galaxy.
Articles this image appears in
Galactic Center
Creator
2MASS/G. Kopan, R. Hurt

Not promoted MER-C 04:06, 4 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]