Title: The Milky Way in Sagittarius

Source: NASA

Information: Generally the most spectacular portions of the Milky Way Galaxy lie in the constellations Cygnus, Scutum, and Sagittarius. The very brightest portion is located just north of the star Gamma Sagittarii, and is referred to as the Great Sagittarius Star Cloud. Within the cloud is an enormous and highly concentrated conglomeration of stars thought to be a portion of the actual core of the Milky Way. Cosmic dust and dark light absorbing matter is so dense in the area of the Great Cloud that the actual nucleus of the galaxy is completely obscured and will probably never be seen. Our sun, travelling within the galaxy, moves at a rate of about 250 km/sec., and makes a complete revolution around the core approximately every 200 million years, a period of time referred to as a "cosmic year."