Our galaxy isn’t flat but warped and twisted, say astronomers

There was a time hundreds of years back, people believed that Earth was flat and anyone who told otherwise was punished or worse—killed. However, those days are long gone, today we have pushed the limits of human imagination and explored our solar system and beyond.

Now it is proved that Our galaxy Milky Way isn’t flat,rather its dramatically warped and twisted in shape.  The astronomers studied for six years special pulsating stars and found a new and improved 3D model of our galaxy.

The work was conducted by the researchers at the University of Warsaw, who observed  “Cepheid variable stars”.

Cepheid variable stars are basically young stellar bodies that burn far brighter than the sun but also pulse in a very stable pattern. Furthermore, the frequency of that pulsing corresponds directly to how bright it gets. Meaning— once you know the frequency of the pulses, you know objectively how much light the star puts out. Then by comparing the absolute amount to the amount that reaches us, you can tell with accurate precision how far that light has had to travel.

“Distances to Cepheids can be measured with an accuracy better than 5%,” said lead author DorotaSkowron in a video explaining the findings. “It is not some statistical fact available only to a scientist’s understanding. It is apparent by eye,” she added.

The Warsaw team found thousands of Cepheid variable stars in the sky through the Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment—a project that tracks the brightness of billions of stellar objects. The team cataloged and observed these stars for years and with repeated readings, a picture of the galaxy was born- and it was curved in nature!