This striking view of the central parts of the Milky Way was obtained with the VISTA survey telescope at ESO’s Paranal Observatory in Chile. This huge picture is 108 200 by 81 500 pixels and contains nearly nine billion pixels. It was created by combining thousands of individual images from VISTA, taken through three different infrared filters, into a single monumental mosaic. These data form part
![VISTA gigapixel mosaic of the central parts of the Milky Way](https://cdn-ak-scissors.b.st-hatena.com/image/square/4b7d01210651c28c10cd2b83b44347d881165319/height=288;version=1;width=512/http%3A%2F%2Fcdn.eso.org%2Fimages%2Fscreen%2Feso1242a.jpg)