The Galactic Centre and Sagittarius B2

Colour-composite image of the Galactic Centre and Sagittarius B2 as seen by the ATLASGAL survey. The centre of the Milky Way is home to a supermassive black hole more than four million times the mass of our Sun. It is about 25 000 light years from Earth. Sagittarius B2 (Sgr B2) is one of the largest clouds of molecular gas in the Milky Way. This dense region lies close to the Galactic Centre and is rich in many different interstellar molecules.

In this image, the ATLASGAL submillimetre-wavelength data are shown in red, overlaid on a view of the region in infrared light, from the Midcourse Space Experiment (MSX) in green and blue. Sagittarius B2 is the bright orange-red region to the middle left of the image, which is centred on the Galactic Centre.

Credit:

ESO/APEX & MSX/IPAC/NASA

About the Image

Id:eso0924e
Type:Observation
Release date:1 July 2009
Related releases:eso0924
Size:2113 x 1074 px

About the Object

Name:Milky Way Galactic Centre, Sagittarius B2
Type:Milky Way : Nebula : Appearance : Dark : Molecular Cloud
Milky Way : Galaxy
Category:Galaxies
Nebulae

Image Formats

Large JPEG
1.0 MB
Screensize JPEG
245.4 KB

Wallpapers

1024x768
427.2 KB
1280x1024
668.0 KB
1600x1200
917.7 KB
1920x1200
1.1 MB
2048x1536
1.3 MB

Colours & filters

BandWavelengthTelescope
Infrared Other
Infrared Other
Millimeter
Submillimetre
870 μmAtacama Pathfinder Experiment
LABOCA