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New high-resolution image of Milky Way made by physicist
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A color all-sky panorama image of the Milky Way
A physicist has been able to make a new panoramic image of the Milky Way by assembling 3000 individual photos. Axel Mellinger, a professor at Central Michigan University put together the image, which shows a full sky panorama that centerpieces our galaxy.
The process Mellinger used to make the image is described in the November issue of Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific.
The image shows stars that are 1000 fainter than can be seen with the naked eye, Mellinger said. It also shows hundreds of galaxies, nebulae and star clusters.
Mellinger traveled more than 26,000 miles over 22 months to take pictures of the sky from South Africa, Texas and Michigan. Once he had all the photographs he started the tedious process of putting them together to make the complete sky image.
To make the photographs blend together seamlessly, Mellinger had to account for the distortions that result from having single two-dimensional images. This was fixed by spending hours on a computer using a mathematical model. He also had to adjust the background light pollution in every photo so that they would all blend in on the finished piece.
The result is a giant image of the Milky Way consisting of 648 megapixels. No one on Earth could ever see the galaxy in the way it appears on the image from a single spot. Mellinger says he will make the image available to planetariums worldwide.
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