AG Carinae (AG Car) – an example of a Luminous Blue Variable (LBV) star. Credit: Judy Schmidt/Hubble Space Telescope.
A new study based on the first Gaia data release (DR1) reveals more accurate measurements of the distance of four canonical luminous blue variables (LBVs) in the Milky Way galaxy. DR1 contains a catalog of over 1 billion stars with precise measurements of their brightness and positions in the sky. These data were obtained by ESA’s Gaia satellite, which is completing the first-ever “galactic census”—the most detailed 3D map of the Milky Way ever made. The release of DR1 offers the scientific community an excellent opportunity to improve knowledge of our stellar environment and to redefine previous calculations.
Combing through the data obtained by Gaia, Nathan Smith of Uni...
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