Astronomy Picture of the Day

Explanation: What does the Milky Way look like in radio waves? To better find out, GLEAM surveyed the central band of our galaxy in high resolution radio light as imaged by the Murchison Widefield Array in Australia. As the featured video slowly scrolls, radio light (71 - 231 MHz) is seen on the left and visible light -- from the same field -- on the right. Differences are so great because most objects glow differently in radio and visible light, and because visible light is stopped by nearby interstellar dust. These differences are particularly apparent in the direction toward the centre of our galaxy, seen about a third of the way through. Among the many features that appear in the radio, bright red patches are usually supernova remnants of exploded stars, while areas coloured blue are stellar nurseries filled with bright young stars.