Siena Galaxy Atlas

  • Astronomers have created a beautiful atlas of 400,000 galaxies in the cosmic
    neighbourhood of Milky Way and named it the Siena Galaxy Atlas.
  • Siena Galaxy Atlas is a digital atlas that was created to get to know our universe better
    through several of the known galaxies.
  • It was created using data from three astronomical surveys collected between 2014 and
    2017 at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO) and Kitt Peak National
    Observatory (KPNO). Together, these surveys are known as the DESI Legacy Surveys.
  • It Is dependent on state-of-the-art digital images captured by advanced technology,
    unlike previous atlases, which relied on antiquated equipment and photographic plates.
  • As it is built on the images captured with highly sensitive instruments, it boasts the most
    accurate data.
  • It is also the first cosmic atlas to feature the light profiles of galaxies - a curve that
    describes how the brightness of the galaxy changes from its brightest point to its
    dimmest.