Desert in Milky Way: Scientists Discover Heart Of Milky Way Is A Desolate, Lifeless Space [VIDEO]
If a new study by an international team of scientists does prove to be true, the heart of our own galaxy, the Milky Way, might actually be pretty lifeless. In fact, the study's findings seem to suggest that the most desolate place in the entire Milky Way galaxy is none other than its core.
The groundbreaking conclusion was the result of a study by scientists from Japan, Germany, Italy and South Africa. The scientists used the light from stars called Cepheids in order to determine how active life was within the massive bulge in the center of the Milky Way.
Cepheids are young supergiants which are known to pulsate in regular cycles. By studying the rate of the stars' pulsations, the scientists were able to calculate the stars' brightness and distance from the Earth.
While the approach is pretty straightforward, spotting Cepheids in the central bulge of the galaxy is actually easier said than done since interstellar clouds are abounding in the area, making it very difficult for telescopes to see what is inside.
Using a revolutionary Japan-South African telescope in South Africa, which is designed to specifically detect near-infrared radiation from Cepheids, the scientists were able to solve the interstellar cloud problem. What they saw then they managed to see the center of the Milky Way was very much unexpected.
While there was a clump of Cepheids that is about 150 light-years across in the very center of the Milky Way, the rest of the galaxy's core, which measures about 8,000 light-years, was a vast, desolate wasteland of space. There were no Cepheids in the area, just a clean, blank void.
Giuseppe Bono, an Italian scientist who took part in the study, stated that the discovery is a very notable change from conventional notions about the Milky Way galaxy.
"The current results indicate that there has been no significant star formation in this large region over hundreds of millions of years. The movement and the chemical composition of the new Cepheids are helping us to better understand the formation and evolution of the Milky Way," Bono said.
The team's findings have been published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.
