Deconstructing the Milky Way Figure 12 .
Inner rings are compositionally similar to arms but have a different origin.
A lane of dust may run along the bar, and a dense stew of dust and stars lies near the galaxy's center, which is probably occupied by a black hole. Much of this is speculative including the appearance of the ring and the structure of the arms, which are probably less clean and continuous than depicted here. The central bar should be the brightest element by far, and the stellar disk would be barely noticeable among the spiral arms.