The Sky According to Planck

Bad Astronomy writes The sky according to Planck "The European Space Agency just released the first all-sky survey taken by their Planck orbiting observatory, and it’s a beauty!"



"Planck observes the sky from the far infrared all the way out to near radio frequencies, detecting cold gas and dust, star forming regions, and even the subtle and cooling glow of the background fire from the Big Bang itself. In this image, infrared is blue, and the longer wavelengths (out toward the radio part of the spectrum) are progressively more red. It shows the whole sky, which is why the image is an oval; that keeps the map from getting too distorted (like how maps of the Earth are distorted near the edges). The line running horizontally across the image is the Milky Way galaxy itself."