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The Orion Arm, also known as the Orion–Cygnus Arm, is a minor spiral arm within the Milky Way Galaxy spanning 3,500 light-years (1,100 parsecs) in width and extending roughly 20,000 light-years (6,100 parsecs) in length. [2] This galactic structure encompasses the Solar System, including Earth.
The Milky Way's spiral structure is uncertain, and there is currently no consensus on the nature of the Milky Way's arms. [212] Perfect logarithmic spiral patterns only crudely describe features near the Sun, [210] [213] because galaxies commonly have arms that branch, merge, twist unexpectedly, and feature a degree of irregularity.
The Milky Way is a barred spiral galaxy with two major arms and a number of minor arms or spurs. [1] The Perseus Spiral Arm, with a radius of approximately 10.7 kiloparsecs, is located between the minor Cygnus and Carina–Sagittarius Arms. [1] It is named after the Perseus constellation in the direction of which it is seen from Earth.
Observed structure of the Milky Way's spiral arms. The Carina–Sagittarius Arm (also known as the Sagittarius Arm or Sagittarius–Carina Arm, labeled -I [clarification needed]) is generally thought to be a minor spiral arm of the Milky Way galaxy. [1] Each spiral arm is a long, diffuse curving streamer of stars that radiates from the Galactic ...
The spiral arm of the Milky Way Galaxy through which the Sun is currently travelling. Orbit of the Solar System: 17,200 pc 5.31×10 17: 17.72: The average diameter of the orbit of the Solar System relative to the Galactic Center. The Sun's orbital radius is roughly 8,600 parsecs, or slightly over halfway to the galactic edge.
The Sun is part of one of the Milky Way's outer spiral arms, known as the Orion–Cygnus Arm or Local Spur. [270] [271] It is a member of the thin disk population of stars orbiting close to the galactic plane. [272] Its speed around the center of the Milky Way is about 220 km/s, so that it completes one revolution every 240 million years. [269]
The Local Bubble, or Local Cavity, [3] is a relative cavity in the interstellar medium (ISM) of the Orion Arm in the Milky Way.It contains the closest of celestial neighbours and among others, the Local Interstellar Cloud (which contains the Solar System), the neighbouring G-Cloud, the Ursa Major moving group (the closest stellar moving group) and the Hyades (the nearest open cluster).
The Scutum–Centaurus Arm, also known as Scutum-Crux arm, is a long, diffuse curving streamer of stars, gas and dust that spirals outward from the proximate end of the Milky Way's central bar. The Milky Way has been posited since the 1950s to have four spiral arms; numerous studies contest or nuance this number. [1]