Explore Earth and its relationships with a plethora of planets, stars and galaxies in its cosmic family, Laniakea, the immense heaven
Our planet’s ohana expands farther beyond the Solar System. According to NASA, the first few
decades of space exploration is merely the beginning as humans continue to reveal the secrets of the cosmos with ever-advancing technology and no shortage of imagination.
We begin with Earth, our home...
Diameter: 12,760km
It is the only habitable planet that scientists know, about thereby making it the only place where people can live. While it does indeed look majestic and everlasting, humans each have a responsibility to take care of it. As Robert Swan stated, “The greatest threat to our planet is the belief that someone else will save it.”
Using radiometric dating, lunar rock samples, and meteorite analysis, scientists estimated the Earth to be over 4.54 billion years old.
The largest living structure on Earth is known as The Great Barrier Reef. It stretches for more than 2,300 kilometers and hosts 1,625 species of fish. The first person to circumnavigate the globe was Juan Sebastian Elcano, after Ferdinand Magellan’s death in the Philippines. They completed the three-year journey in 1522.
We are part of the Solar System, our closest ohana
Diameter: 1.58 - 3.16 light years (one light year is 9.461 trillion kilometers)
Including Earth, there are eight planets in our little space family, starting with Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars. The outer planets begin with Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. The Sun’s light can essentially reach an infinite distance in space, as there is no theoretical limit to light.
The Oort Cloud is considered to be the edge of the Solar System. It is a distant spherical shell of icy objects that could be as large as mountains. It is also thought to be the source of long-period comets.
The Heliosphere is a bubble-like shield built of solar wind that protect the Solar System from cosmic rays that could otherwise enter. This helps protects the planets from high-energy radiation. Beyond it is interstellar space.
Alpha Centauri is the solar system’s closest neighbor. It has three stars: Alpha Centauri A and B, which are among the brightest stars you can see at night, and Proxima Centauri, which has a planet that could potentially host life.
Our solar system is just one of thousands in the Milky Way
Diameter: 120,000 light years
The Milky Way galaxy currently consists of 3,916 discovered solar systems. That means we have more than 3,000 families just like ours with more to be found.
At the center of the Milky Way is a super massive black hole the galaxy orbits around. It is known as Sagittarius A* and is 4.3 million times more massive than the Sun.
Our solar system is located in what’s known as the Orion Arm. This is just one of the branches or spurs of the four main arms of our galaxy. It is about 27,000 light years away from Sagittarius A*.
In about 4.5 billion years, the Milky Way will collide with its neighboring galaxy, Andromeda. Together, they will form a new galaxy. Our solar system will survive this but will take a new position in the universe.
...And the Milky Way is just one in more than 50 galaxies in what we call the “Local Group.”
Diameter: 10,000,000 light years
The Local Group is an ohana of galaxies bound together because of gravity. There are three major galaxies in the local group: Andromeda, Milky Way, and Triangulum. Many more are still unconfirmed.
The Local Group is part of a larger family that we call the Virgo Super cluster.
Diameter: 110,000,000 light years
Containing at least 100 galaxy groups, the Virgo Super cluster is a colossal network of around 45,000 galaxies all being pulled by a gravitational force.
And the Milky Way is just one in more than 50 galaxies in what we call the “Local Group”
Diameter: 10,000,000 light years
The Local Group is an ohana of galaxies bound together because of gravity. There are three major galaxies in the local group: Andromeda, Milky Way, and Triangulum. Many more are still unconfirmed.
The Virgo Super cluster was thought to be the largest cosmic ohana that we belonged to, until in 2014 a team of astronomers in the University of Hawaii discovered...
Laniekea, the immense heaven
Diameter: 520,000,000 light years
Can you still see the Milky Way? It is just a tiny dot in this vast map of super clusters. With approximately 100,000 galaxies, this family potentially holds billions of stars.
Laniakea itself is part of an even larger cosmic family called the cosmic web. Today, the cosmic web is what’s considered to be the largest known structure of organized matter in the observable universe. The observable universe is approximately 93 billion light years, and as the name suggests, that’s the part of the universe that we can currently study because of the limitations in our technology. All in all, our cosmic family has an estimated number of 2 trillion galaxies, 200 sextillion stars, and quadrillions of planets.