how can we take pictures of our galaxy-the milky way when we are a part of it?

Question

for example when we are in a house we cannot see it from outside similarly how can we see the milky way

Answer 1

Because you make the "taking a picture of the outside of a house when located inside" analogy I think you might be referring to the pictures of the Milky Way that seem to be panned out views of the whole galaxy such as this one: http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/multimedia/gallery/MilkyWay.jpg

These pictures are fictional representations of what the Milky Way galaxy would look like if you were able to view it from a distance.

Currently the Milky Way is classified as a spiral galaxy (see note below) and our solar system, and thus our planet, happens to be located in an outer arm of that spiral. This means we are able to observe and photograph the center of our galaxy, and opposing outer spirals, as seen from our vantage point only. Such as these taken from our earthly vantage point way back in the 1950s: http://www.astro.wisc.edu/~dolan/constellations/mw/MilkyWay.html

We can also use infrared and other methods to take "pictures" of the center of our galaxy, these give us a side-view perspective, again from the vantage point of our solar system's location within the Milky Way. An example of this can be found here: http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap950908.html

I hope this helps to directly answer your question, Cheers.

Note: The Milky Way is considered at this time to be a spiral galaxy, there are recent suggestions that it should be reclassified as a barred (SB) or barred spiral galaxy (SAB) rather than a pure spiral (Sb or Sbc) but that is another discussion.

Answer 2

U can even see part of milky way galaxy with ur naked eye, google up stuff and there should be websites which will tell u when is the next time and at what place will u be able to see milky way. Most likely u will be able to see at around 1-3 am in night and it should be in a village where there r no street lights, coz there is no major requirement to see which is the place should be as dark as possible.

Answer 3

Just look up at the sky and find that part of it that seems to have the most stars in it...that's the Milky Way. Unfortunately for the most of us who live in the northern hemisphere, we are relegated to look out at the outer rim of the galaxy.

So, even though there are a lot of stars, there are a way lot more to see from the southern hemisphere. That results because those lucky stiffs can peer into the center of our galaxy where there are a way lot more stars to see.

Answer 4

We cannot. The pictures that are usually shown as our galaxy are actually of another galaxy or set of stars. The only thing that is visible is a white band (maybe part of the tail) but I believe you need a good telescope to see even that.

Using your example: if you could never leave your house, it would be like taking a picture of the house across the street and telling you that is your house.

Answer 5

because........
Our galaxy is a spiral of the Sb type, with average size and mass: it contains approximately 150 billion stars. It is only partly visible, since we are inside it; the plane of the disc and the thousands of stars it contains appear to us like a white milky band in the sky, called the Milky Way.
Galileo was the first man to observe the Milky Way, but it was only at the end of 1700 that William Herschel discovered the disc structure of the Galaxy.

Image of our galaxy; you can see the plane of the disc

The structure and the dynamics of the Milky Way

The Galaxy is composed of a central bulge, a disc, the spiral arms and the halo. The bulge is 16,000 light years thick, it is situated in the centre of the disc which is 2,000 light years thick, and has a diameter 100,000 light years long. The disc contains the spiral arms, like "stripes" of gas and stars that originate in the nucleus and wind all around it. The disc is surrounded by a halo, almost spherical, made of globular clusters, that spreads up to a diameter of 150,000 light years.
Three arms were discovered in our galaxy: the Orion one (where our Sun is), Perseus and Sagittarius. The absorption of light by the gas and dust prevents us from observing the arms on the opposite side of the galaxy.
Half the stars of our galaxy are isolated, and half gathered in open and globular clusters. The former can be found mainly in the arms of the disc, the latter in the halo.


The M3 globular cluster in the constellation of the Canis Venatici. (SEDS)
Besides, there are clouds of gas and dust, that form various kinds of nebulae . The most famous are those of the Vela, the Crab, (remains of the explosion of supernovae), but also the dark "Horse Head" nebula in the Orion constellation (made of dust that absorbs the stellar light). The interstellar matter is mostly concentrated in the spiral arms: it is the raw material for the formation of new stars.
The stars can be divided in two populations: the population II, that is of first generation, that date back to the early phases of the life of our galaxy, when the gas consisted of Hydrogen almost completely; the population I, the second generation, made of gas already enriched by the first generation stars, that exploded as supernovae or released the gas in form of stellar wind. The latter have a composition richer in metals. The old stars are situated mainly in the bulge or in the halo, the young ones mainly in the spiral arms.

As in the other spiral galaxies, all the stars in our galaxy rotate around the centre along elliptic or almost circular orbits; the speed increases with the distance from the centre, reaches a maximum and then decreases gradually. The halo does not take part in the rotation motion of the Galaxy.
Our Solar system is situated at the periphery of the galaxy, at approximately 28,000 light years from its centre, around which it rotates with a speed of approximately 250 Km/s, and it is 30 light years high on the galactic plane.
The analysis of the rotation curve of the Galaxy (that is the trend of the rotation speed of the stars, as a function of the distance from the galactic centre) demonstrated that, at large distances from its centre, such speed remains quite high, instead of decreasing as expected. This means that the gravitational field exerted on these stars is not that expected according to the measurement of the galactic mass. There must be some other kind of matter, not visible, able to produce a strong gravitational field: it is supposed that the galaxies are surrounded by massive halos of dark matter, that often connects the galaxies, like an actual "bridge".

Answer 6

Advanced satellite techonology, like the Hubble program, allow us to see our galaxy unlike any ever imagined. That and years of scientific astrological study have given us a fairly good idea of our Milky Way galaxy.

Bear this in mind: In the early centuries of history, map makers used rather crude instruments to map out the land--way way way before satellites offered a hand--and they got it fairly well on target.

Answer 7

To be honest, we don't. We can see all parts of it, and have seen other spiral galaxies, we have a pretty good sense of what it looks like, and advanced programs used by astronomers and the like can replicate a pretty good image.

Answer 8

It's just like the house analogy, you can take a picture, but it'll just be a part, you may get a wall in your house, but you can still take the picture.

Answer 9

Your going to need to have a sadilite to do that but that is a lot of money.

Answer 10

hmm i don't know ...im writing this to save it so I can check if someone else knows...but my guess is that it is sooooo big that we can see enough of it from our perspective that it looks like were on hte outside....