Astronomers Release Most Detailed Infrared Map of the Milky Way

The map, compiled over 13 years, reveals 1.5 billion cosmic objects and offers unprecedented insights into our galaxy's structure.

The map was created using the ESO's Visible and Infrared Survey Telescope for Astronomy (VISTA) at the Paranal Observatory in Chile.
The project gathered 500 terabytes of data from 200,000 images taken over 420 nights between 2010 and 2023.
The infrared map includes a wide range of objects, from newborn stars and brown dwarfs to free-floating planets and globular clusters.
The survey covered an area of the sky equivalent to 8,600 full moons and contains about 10 times more objects than a previous map from 2012.
The data has led to over 300 scientific articles and promises to enhance our understanding of the Milky Way for years to come.