This diagram shows the 100-million-year-long trajectory of the Smith Cloud as it arcs out of the plane of our Milky Way galaxy and then returns like a boomerang. Hubble Space Telescope measurements show that the cloud, because of its chemical composition, came out of a region near the edge of the galaxy's disk of stars 70 million years ago. The cloud is now stretched into the shape of a comet by gravity and gas pressure. Following a ballistic path, the cloud will fall back into the disk and trigger new star formation 30 million years from now.
Credits
Illustration: NASA, ESA, and A. Feild (STScI);Science: NASA, ESA, and A. Fox (STScI)
| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | Smith Cloud, Milky Way |
| Object Description | Active Galactic Nuclei Beyond the Milky Way's High-Velocity Smith Cloud |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description | The HST data were taken from proposal : A. Fox and K. Sembach (STScI), F. Lockman (NRAO/Green Bank), B. Menard (Johns Hopkins University), N. Lehner (University of Notre Dame), A. Hill (Haverford College), K. Barger (Texas Christian University), F. Heitsch and D.V. Stark (University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill), M. Rahman (Johns Hopkins University), and R. Benjamin (University of Wisconsin, Whitewater). The science team for these findings includes: A. Fox (STScI), N. Lehner (University of Notre Dame), F. Lockman (NRAO/Green Bank), B. Wakker (University of Wisconsin, Madison), A. Hill (Haverford College), F. Heitsch (University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill), D.V. Stark (University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill/Kavli Institute, Kashiwa, Japan), K. Barger (Texas Christian University), K. Sembach (STScI), and M. Rahman (Johns Hopkins University). |
| Instrument | HST>COS |
| Exposure Dates | October 23 - 28, 2014 |
| Filters | Grating: G130M |
| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | A name or catalog number that astronomers use to identify an astronomical object. |
| Object Description | The type of astronomical object. |
| R.A. Position | Right ascension – analogous to longitude – is one component of an object's position. |
| Dec. Position | Declination – analogous to latitude – is one component of an object's position. |
| Constellation | One of 88 recognized regions of the celestial sphere in which the object appears. |
| Distance | The physical distance from Earth to the astronomical object. Distances within our solar system are usually measured in Astronomical Units (AU). Distances between stars are usually measured in light-years. Interstellar distances can also be measured in parsecs. |
| Dimensions | The physical size of the object or the apparent angle it subtends on the sky. |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description |
|
| Instrument | The science instrument used to produce the data. |
| Exposure Dates | The date(s) that the telescope made its observations and the total exposure time. |
| Filters | The camera filters that were used in the science observations. |
| About The Image | |
| Image Credit | The primary individuals and institutions responsible for the content. |
| Publication Date | The date and time the release content became public. |
| Color Info | A brief description of the methods used to convert telescope data into the color image being presented. |
| Orientation | The rotation of the image on the sky with respect to the north pole of the celestial sphere. |
