![]() This is the information needed to weigh the Galaxy, and determine the distribution – and perhaps the properties – of Dark Matter, the mysterious substance which dominates the mass of the Galaxy and the Universe. ![]() Seven million stars have their line of sight velocities measured, providing full 6-dimensional – three space positions, 3 space motions – information, determining full orbits for those stars in the Milky Way. This second data release allows progress in all these studies by providing not only distances and apparent motions across the sky for 1.3billion sources, but also very precise measurements of brightness and colour for an even larger catalogue of 1.7billion sources. These results allow improved study of almost all branches of astronomy: from traces of the formation of the Solar System through how stars evolve through the current structure, the assembly and evolutionary history of the Milky Way to mapping the distribution of Dark Matter in the Galaxy to establishing the distance scale in the Universe to discovery of rare objects. This new release of information is showing us 600 times more stars than previously available, covering a volume 1000 times larger than Gaia’s own first data release two years ago, with precision some one hundred times improved. The detailed information of this census of over one billion stars allows their positions and distances to be mapped to unprecedented precision giving us a true 3-dimensional map of our Milky Way Galaxy.
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