Summary:
- On a clear night away from lights, the view is of a bright white river of stars.
- The Milky Way is made of millions of stars along with a lot of gas and dust.
- It looks different from other galaxies because we are looking at the main disk from within the galaxy.
- At the center of the Milky Way and most other galaxies, is a supermassive black hole.
- The disk is about 100,000 light-years across and 3,000 Light-years thick.
- Most of the Galaxy’s gas, dust, young stars, and open clusters are in the disk.