page_title: Far 3 kpc Arm
hierarchical_section_title: Far 3 kpc Arm
caption_attribution_description: English: This detailed annotated map shows the structure of the Milky Way, including the location of the spiral arms and other components such as the bulge. This version of the image has been updated to include the most recent mapping of the shape of the central bulge deduced from survey data from ESO’s VISTA telescope at the Paranal Observatory. The original image was published in 2008 by NASA/JPL-Caltech (author R. Hurt).
context_page_description: The Far 3 kpc Arm was discovered in 2008 by astronomer Tom Dame, while preparing a talk on the Galaxy's spiral arms for a meeting of the 212th American Astronomical Society. It is one of Milky Way's spiral arms and it is located in the first galactic quadrant at a distance of 3 kpc from the galactic center. Along with the Near 3 kpc Arm whose existence is known since the mid-1950s, the counterpart inner arms establish our Galaxy's simple symmetry.
  Tom Dame and collaborator Patrick Thaddeus analyzed data obtained using a 1.2-meter-diameter millimeter-wave telescope located at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile. They detected the presence of the spiral arm in a CO survey and later confirmed their discovery using 21-centimeter radio measurements of atomic hydrogen collected by colleagues in Australia.
context_section_description: The Far 3 kpc Arm was discovered in 2008 by astronomer Tom Dame (Harvard-Smithsonian CfA), while preparing a talk on the Galaxy's spiral arms for a meeting of the 212th American Astronomical Society. It is one of Milky Way's spiral arms and it is located in the first galactic quadrant at a distance of 3 kpc (about 10,000 ly) from the galactic center. Along with the Near 3 kpc Arm whose existence is known since the mid-1950s, the counterpart inner arms establish our Galaxy's simple symmetry.
  Tom Dame and collaborator Patrick Thaddeus analyzed data obtained using a 1.2-meter-diameter millimeter-wave telescope located at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO) in Chile. They detected the presence of the spiral arm in a CO survey and later confirmed their discovery using 21-centimeter radio measurements of atomic hydrogen collected by colleagues in Australia.
caption: Artist's conception of the spiral structure of the Milky Way with two major stellar arms and a central bar. In this image the Far 3 kpc Arm is located near the center, above and to the left of the bulge.
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