Planet Earth Solar System Milky Way Galaxy

The sun s orbital radius is roughly 8 600 parsecs or slightly over half way to the galactic edge.

Planet earth solar system milky way galaxy.

A galaxy is held together by gravity. The average diameter of the orbit of the solar system relative to the galactic center. In galaxies the solar systems are separated by vast sections of mostly empty space. The milky way galaxy is a very very big place.

Orbit of the solar system. Many people are not clear about the difference between our solar system our milky way galaxy and the universe. The minor arms are primarily filled with gas and pockets of star forming activity. 14 15 the nearest exoplanets are located 4 2 light years 1 3 parsecs from earth and orbit proxima centauri the closest star to the sun.

The galaxy that contains the earth and its solar system is called the milky way. Galaxies like solar systems are held together by gravity. There is evidence that extragalactic planets exoplanets farther away in galaxies beyond the local milky way galaxy may exist. Our milky way galaxy is just one of billions of galaxies in the universe.

This means there are potentially thousands of planetary systems like our solar system within the galaxy. Earth is well equipped as a planet and ideally placed in our solar system and galaxy to support life as we know it. Let s look at the basics. Fact that earth based observations were complicated by the fact that the earth is embedded in the solar system.

But where is our solar system. Our solar system consists of our star the sun and its orbiting planets including earth along with numerous moons asteroids comet material rocks and dust our sun is just one star among the hundreds of billions of stars in our milky way galaxy. A galaxy is a system of solar systems and other stars. The first two are easy to grasp but.

It s a small part of the milky way galaxy. Earth the solar system oort cloud local fluff local bubble orion arm milky way galaxy local group virgo supercluster laniakea supercluster universe. We live on a planet called earth that is part of our solar system. The product of some 4 6 billion years of cosmic construction our planet is.

A galaxy is a huge collection of gas dust and billions of stars and their solar systems. The milky way galaxy the major arms consist of the highest densities of both young and old stars. Within it there are at least 100 billion stars and on average each star has at least one planet orbiting it. One orbital period of the solar system lasts between 225 and 250 million years.

Our galaxy the milky way also has a supermassive black hole in the middle.