Free Astronomy Magazine May-June 2016

44 MAY-JUNE 2016 SPACE CHRONICLES the distribution of cold dense gas along the plane of the Milky Way galaxy. The new image (constructed from individual APEX observations of radiation with a wavelength of 870 µm) includes most of the re- gions of star formation in the south- ern Milky Way. The new ATLASGAL maps cover an area of sky 140 degrees long and 3 degrees wide, more than four times larger than the first ATLASGAL re- lease. The new maps are also of higher quality, as some areas were re-observed to obtain a more uni- form data quality over the whole survey area. The ATLASGAL survey is the single most successful APEX large programme with nearly 70 as- sociated science papers already pub- lished, and its legacy will expand much further with all the reduced ATLASGAL survey of Milky Way completed by ESO A PEX, the Atacama Pathfinder EXperiment telescope, is lo- cated at 5100 metres above sea level on the Chajnantor Plateau in Chile’s Atacama region. The ATLAS- GAL survey took advantage of the unique characteristics of the tele- scope to provide a detailed view of