In connection with the new data from the spectrograph of the Hubble telescope, astronomers led by John Stock from the University of Boulder, Colorado, write that now it is necessary to re-consider the size of the halos of galaxies of the same type as the Milky Way, and this means re-evaluating them. masses.
And if until today the estimated size of the disk of our galaxy was estimated at 100,000 light years, and the halo protruded for another ten thousand light years, now it was possible to find out the diameter of the halo, reaching more than 1 million light years, and this is ten times larger than the disk alone The Milky Way. In kilometers, this would be about ten quintillion.
The gas and dust that are so far from the center of the galaxy were probably removed this distance due to supernova explosions, but they are again attracted to us and participate in the formation of celestial bodies, reaching the galactic disk.
Using research already done on the composition and density of gas throughout the entire area of the Milky Way, astronomers suggest that the mass of the discovered reserves of space building material is approximately equal to the mass of all stars in a medium-sized spiral galaxy like ours. According to John Stock himself, this amazed scientists.
After all, the find means that the ordinary matter of the galactic disks is somewhere twice as much as it was assumed, and the dark matter, although not much, is less.
In the most daring theories put forward earlier, the mass of gas was five times more than scientists could see, and what Hubble's observations made it possible to learn about, helps to connect scientists between the practical and theoretical sides of the issue.
A special report on this study by the group of astronomers John Stock was presented on June 27 this year at a conference at the University of Edinburgh.