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 The Milky Way Galaxy

The Milky Way Galaxy is a spiral galaxy that contains about one hundred to two hundred billion stars. It has dust clouds called nebulae. They block out light from some stars. You cannot see most nebulae. Scientists think that the Milky Way estimates to be one hundred thousand light years in diameter and fifteen thousand light years thick. Even if traveling at light speed, it would take one hundred thousand years to travel across.

The Milky Way rotates around its center. The Milky Way turns counterclockwise. It takes the solar system two hundred billion years to move around the center of the Milky Way Galaxy. Scientists theorize that since the Earth moves around the sun and that the solar system moves around the Milky Way Galaxy that the Milky Way Galaxy Must rotate around the center of the universe. Nobody knows if this is true because satellites can't reach that far and humans can't travel in space for very long.

There are two types of star clusters in our galaxy. There are open clusters and there are globular clusters. Globular clusters are a round shape. They can contain more than one hundred thousand stars. Open clusters aren't as neat as globular clusters. They contain hundreds of stars.