Believe it or not, there's a bar in space. But you wouldn't want
to order drinks there. New observations led by astronomers at
the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in northern Chile
confirm that about 10,000 red giant stars—which are much older
and brighter than our sun—orbit the center of the Milky Way,
creating what looks like a large cylindrical bar (artist's
impression, shown). Other stars in that region of space
presumably orbit the galactic center in a similar fashion. The
research also suggests that the axis of the bar is pointed
almost directly at our solar system, with our sun (which sits in
a spiral arm of the Milky Way between one-half and two-thirds of
the distance from the galaxy's center toward its edge) lying
about 20° off the bar's axis. Perhaps the results will inspire a
new drink: The Red Giant. See more ScienceShots.