This stunning Milky Way infrared image is the most detailed one yet, compiled from 500 terabytes of data

Astronomers have created the most detailed infrared map of the Milky Way, revealing over 1.5 billion objects. Using the European Southern Observatory’s (ESO) VISTA telescope in Chile, the project spanned 13 years, gathering a whopping 500 terabytes of data—making it the largest survey ever conducted with an ESO telescope.

Led by astrophysicist Dante Minniti, the team used VISTA’s infrared camera, VIRCAM, to peer through the dust and gas in the galaxy's core, uncovering hidden regions. This dataset, made up of 200,000 images, covers an area of the sky equivalent to 8600 full moons and includes ten times more objects than a 2012 survey. It reveals everything from newborn stars in dusty clouds to globular clusters and even brown dwarfs and free-floating planets.

As per the reports, the dataset is too massive to be released as a single image, but the processed data and objects catalogue can be accessed via the ESO Science Portal here.

The team also tracked fast-moving hypervelocity stars and charted objects that periodically change in brightness, providing an accurate 3D map of the inner Milky Way. This record-breaking data collection is part of the VVV and VVVX surveys, which have already generated over 300 scientific papers. With future upgrades to the VISTA and Very Large Telescope (VLT), astronomers expect even more discoveries from the millions of surveyed objects.

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