Talk:Large Magellanic Cloud/Archive 1

comments
Will someone please check my figures and math on the apparent size of the LMC? —ZorkFox 02:02, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

radius
The radius of the LMC was listed as 20,000 - 50,000. I changed that to 10,000 ly, a much more realistic estemate. I am sure that the old value is incorrect. I also thinks that 'radius' and 'diameter' are treated as the same in most galaxy articles, which is of course incorrect. Radius is half a diameter! DaMatriX 20:18, 24 January 2006 (UTC)


 * The Radius figure in the info box is indeed confusing. It currently says "Radius - 35,200 ly (tidal)", now I don't know what "tidal" means (if anything), but this seems like a crazy size, it would therefore have a diameter of 70,400 LYs, that's nearly as big as the Milky Way! How can this be an accurate estimate for "Dwarf Galaxy"?
 * Also it says in the opening paragraph that LMC is about 1/20 the diameter of the Milky Way "It has about 1/20 the diameter of our galaxy", so that is about 5,000 LYs in diameter and 2,500 LYs in Radius (which sounds like a much more reasonable estimate).
 * So does anyone know the actual size? Or whether any of these figures are correct? If nobody responds I'll just put in the Radius figure of 2,500 LYs which seems to be closest to the truth.--Hibernian 05:50, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Could someone add a section about the future of this galaxy?
As I understand it, the Milky Way is tearing up all of its satellites by absorbing their stars. Could someone confirm that and mention it in the articles.--Will 05:55, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Distance to the LMC: SN 1987A estimate
I've added data and a reference to the 1998 Harvard article that published a new distance estimate to the LMC based on the observations of SN 1987A. Could someone review my inclusion of that estimate within the estimates formed "within the last decade" that are said to provide a different estimate with a smaller error? Wdfarmer 20:19, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

doesn't orbit milky way?
i recently read this New Scientist article that calls into question whether the LMC orbits the milky way, by claiming that its speed is too high, and it simply passing by. hopefully this can be included in the article (as well as in SMC). Mlm42 09:33, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

Size, again
Ok I've just been trying to look into this again, and I recently got the Celestia program, and in that it states the LMC has a diameter of 4.9 Kiloparsecs. Which is about 16,000 light years, so this figure is quite different then what we've been talking about. This NASA page also mentions the LMC being "about 15,000 light-years", so both of these agree. Now this of-course contradicts the claim made in the article that it is "1/20th" the size of the Milky Way, that would make it only 5,000 LY in diameter, so I don't think that figure can not be maintained. It's more like 1/6th or 1/7th the size of our Galaxy. So I'm going to go ahead and add in these numbers. --Hibernian 17:15, 22 June 2007 (UTC)


 * The web site "www.answers.com" states that the apparent size of the LMC is 5 degrees, but that telescopic studies indicate that it is much larger. This agrees with the apparent size of 10.75 degrees in the information box. However, that, at a distance of 168,000 light years, equates to a diameter of 31,150 light years, substantially larger than the figures cited here. I have not posted to Wikipedia before, so I hope that I get the protocols right. If I don't, please excuse errors arising from ignorance. -- Gary Thomas 19 July 2007 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gary Thomas NZ (talk • contribs) 02:23, 19 July 2007 (UTC)


 * I have also seen the comment in various places that the LMC has 1/10 the number of stars as the Milky Way. If the star density is the same in the two galaxies, that would lead to a diameter of 46,000 ly for the LMC (100,000 ly times the cube root of 0.1). The LMC is also admitted to be the fourth largest galaxy in the local cluster (after the Milky Way, M31 and M33). Personally I don't think it is a dwarf galaxy at all. Gary Thomas 20 July 2007 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gary Thomas NZ (talk • contribs) 22:22, 19 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Hi Gary, yes actually I just came back here again because I'm still not satisfied with this thing. I've just discovered that I made a mistake in my previous post, the Celestia program gives the LMC's Radius(!) as 4.9 Kiloparsecs, meaning it's Diameter would be 9.8 Kiloparsecs, which is actually about 32,000 LYs. I've been searching through the Internet in an attempt to get a reliable figure and now think that NASA site must be wrong, as all the other estimates are above 30,000 LYs. As no one here seems to know with any real certainty, I'm going to try to ask some people who hopefully will, I'm going to post about this on the WikiProject Astronomical objects Talk page, to get some attention to the issue (If you can contribute, please do so). (I made that same radius vs. diameter mistake on the SMC page also, so that will have to be addressed as well). --Hibernian 15:09, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Updates and 'Size' discussion
Please note that I have begun the process of updating the scientific information on the LMC. I have updated the intro and distance sections so far, although when I am more awake, I will likely make further corrections to both. In the intro I removed the discussion of the number of stars, since it is relatively meaningless, and replaced it with the mass of the LMC. The distance section is updated with the most current LMC distance. Regarding the discussions of the size of the LMC... when quoting the size of the LMC, many people seem to be quoting an apparent size, which, I assume, is derived from how the LMC looks on the sky. This, like the number of stars, doesn't tell us much of anything about a galaxy. The important number for a galaxy is its tidal radius. This is the radius out to which a star will be bound to that galaxy. The LMC's tidal radius is around 15 kpc. Eventually, I hope to add a section on the structure of the LMC, and hopefully something more detailed about the 'features.' Grochol17 10:05, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Not a satellite
it looks like the LMC is just at its first pass http://www.astronomy.com/asy/default.aspx?c=a&id=6019 — Preceding unsigned comment added by SquallLeonhart ITA (talk • contribs) 21:14, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

Abbreviations
It seems that the Large Magellanic Cloud is abbreviated more than it should be. Also, someone had abbreviated Milky Way to MW, which I felt was unnecessary, and subsequently changed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.250.189.148 (talk) 01:25, 2 November 2007 (UTC)


 * In astronomy literature, it is very common to abbreviate names of objects (and often authors) that are rather long and are repeated throughout a paper. The Milky Way, Small Magellanic Cloud and Large Magellanic Cloud are examples of this.  The proper use of abbreviations is to give the abbreviation after the first usage of the name in the main body of the paper and then use ONLY the abbreviation throughout the rest of the paper.  Thus, the abbreviation of 'Large Magellanic Cloud' is correct, and they way 'Milky Way' had been abbreviated (before you changed it) was also correct. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.167.237.127 (talk) 20:12, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

Pronunciation
How is "Magellanic" pronounced? Nine9s (talk) 22:23, 19 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Since the name is taken from Magellan the explorer, I've always just added an "-ic" to the same pronunciation: mah-JEL-an-ic | Drev19 (talk) 15:41, 27 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Since the English word Magellanic derives from the Latin adjective magellanicus, I pronounce it with an accent on the la, like in Latin. This follows the usual practice when anglicizing Latin scientific terms, like atomic, ionic, isomeric, generic, specific, as well as more general terms like pedantic and scientific. Rwflammang (talk) 00:50, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

New data for LMC
Hi! I strongly suggest the reading of the abstract of this article:

I think it's very important this reference in order to give a full information of recent studies. -- Roberto  Segnali all'Indiano  05:09, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

Image galleries
Besides being generally (a few exceptions exist) discouraged, they're a nuisance on a slow internet connection, a low memory machine and otherwise just an indication of indiscriminate image picking without purpose. Please make a text of the gallery section. There's an increasing tendency to insert galleries in Wikipedia, but besides being a nuisance, they're against the general principles of an encyclopedia, whose main purpose is to inform, not indiscriminately impress with color parades. Rursus dixit. ( m bork3 !) 20:27, 27 February 2010 (UTC)


 * By WP:IG. Rursus dixit. ( m bork3 !) 20:28, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

Current status
In order to get it to B quality, a few sections lacks references and a few basic features: Rursus dixit. ( m bork3 !) 21:57, 2 March 2010 (UTC)
 * section Distance have no references,
 * section X-ray sources have references but for the 3rd para there are none,
 * section Gallery should either be saved to this talk (the easy way) or be renamed to Other Features and contain descriptive texts for each of the categories of those images, moving them here is simplest,
 * section See also should need a few more links.


 * Invitation: Now, in an effort to lift the article from C quality towards GA (good article), I created a draft working space in the User:Rursus/Large Magellanic Cloud and in User talk:Rursus/Large Magellanic Cloud, anyone may feel free to join, and treat those subpages as where they novel draft articles. Rursus dixit. ( m bork3 !) 07:47, 3 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Reference added to section X-ray sources third paragraph mentioned above. Marshallsumter (talk) 00:46, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Not an irregular galaxy?
"The Magellanic Cloud galaxies were once classified as irregular galaxies, but have since been found to contain barred spiral structures, and have been since re-classified as "SBm", a fourth type of barred spiral galaxy, the barred Magellanic spiral type." -- Irregular galaxy —Preceding unsigned comment added by 150.162.131.37 (talk) 19:13, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

SBm!SBm! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.79.176.98 (talk) 07:48, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

SMC & LMC collision
-- apparently the two collided 300 million years ago. -- 65.92.181.190 (talk) 15:40, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

View from the LMC
View from the LMC: it says that this section needs "Additional citations" for verification, but can we just remove the tag per WP:CALC (Routine calculations) as it's obvious that the editor used calculations to write this section and they found out what the apparent magnitude, latitudes, etc... of the Milky Way based on these calculations, hence I don't think it needs the "additional citations" tag. Also it's almost impossible to find a source for this section as (I think) it was written exclusively for Wikipedia by the editor. What do you think? Thanks. Megahmad (talk) 00:34, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

Past and future motion of the LMC?
The current article says next to nothing about the space motion of the LMC. I feel that describing its motion over time is both sufficiently fundamental and sufficiently complex that it deserves its own heading. As other posters to this talk page have pointed out, it's an active question whether the LMC is a satellite of the Milky Way or is just passing us by. It may have nearly clipped the edge of our Milky Way about 250 million years ago and it may be pulled back around for another hit on our galaxy more than a billion years in the future. Earlier references on this topic will contradict later references (and I don't have any recent references handy as I type this), but I feel that the article is significantly incomplete if it does not address this topic.147.144.3.239 (talk) 19:40, 31 July 2014 (UTC)

A disproportionately large share of very luminous stars
Of the 114 stars on the List of most luminous stars, 29 (or 25%) are in the LMC. Why is the LMC so overrepresented when it comes to extremely luminous stars? Surely there must be some theories about this, which the article should discuss. 174.24.28.43 (talk) 18:23, 30 April 2016 (UTC)
 * LMC has had a recent star formation burst. Ruslik_ Zero 03:00, 1 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Would it be proper to list LMC in the brief list of Starbust galaxies? And include a wikilink to that article here? If so, does someone have a "reliable source" for this?   TomS TDotO (talk) 03:59, 1 May 2016 (UTC)

No NGC number?
Why was this omitted from the list? 85.76.164.103 (talk) 06:06, 8 November 2016 (UTC)
 * It wasn't omitted. The LMC contains a couple hundred individual NGC objects. You can see a few dozen of them marked on the main image in the article. Lithopsian (talk) 22:21, 8 November 2016 (UTC)

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Merge Proposal
NGC 2020 and NGC 2014 are not notable by themselves. Together, they form the "cosmic reef" but that term seems to be coming from some sort of NASA press release and has never been used outside of that one source. Sam-2727 (talk) 14:24, 26 April 2020 (UTC)


 * Are NGC 2014 and NGC 2020 notable enough to be mentioned in the article about the Large Magellanic Cloud? I'm not convinced that they are. There are too many NGC objects in the LMC to list many of them in the LMC article. It might be better to leave NGC 2014 and NGC 2020 as separate articles and encourage people to extend them. TowardsTheLight (talk) 15:44, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Not exactly notable by themselves though. Perhaps merge between themselves? (If someone can find reliable sources for this) Sam-2727 (talk) 16:23, 26 April 2020 (UTC)

My opinion is to Keep Them. They are for me notorious, They being imaged for the Hubble Space Telescope's 30th Anniversary. They are absolutely beautiful and gorgeous ! The red color of NGC 2014 is so Beautiful, Red is my favorite color ! The gorgeous structure on one side is so unique, I've never seen such a bubble like structure in any image before ! Its so reef like and NGC 2020 is also amazing ! The staff of the Space Telescope Science Institute even made a visualization of the 3d structure and made me mesmerized in the Two !!! There is Absolutely No reason to Merge them.--THE COLOSSAL GALAXY NAMED IC1101 (talk) 15:18, 22 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Keep both per detailed Hubble article. 94.179.168.56 (talk) 21:38, 28 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes the press has certainly caught onto the name. But perhaps merge the two since they are always mentioned in conjunction to each other? While they might be independently notable, they still don't seem to reasonably demand separate articles. Sam-2727 (talk) 14:09, 29 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Comment. I would suggest that many people will be searching for the name Cosmic Reef, given the only real source of notability, but this doesn't exist even as a redirect.  It is difficult to redirect this term to two different articles.  A combined article might even use it as the title.  Lithopsian (talk) 14:28, 29 April 2020 (UTC)


 * Keep both. In my view NGC 2014 and NGC 2020 are well-defined astronomical objects. In contrast, `Cosmic Reef' appears to be a recent nickname. I tried a full-text search through the Smithsonian/NASA Astrophysics Data System for `Cosmic Reef' and found no matches: it appears that the term is not used in the research literature. `Cosmic Reef' may be a term invented recently for the NASA press release. TowardsTheLight (talk) 19:47, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

We should Absolutely Keep Them, There is no reason for them to be merged. They look like a Cosmic Reef and makes the Large Magellanic Cloud amazing. The colors absolutely mesmerize me ! The unique structures are great. I could find No reason to merge them.THE COLOSSAL GALAXY NAMED IC1101 (talk) 13:14, 23 July 2020 (UTC)
 * When editing in a proposal or RFC, when your comments are directed to the RFC as a whole (as opposed to directly responding to another editor's comment), please start your comment with a bullet, and a bolded one or two word summary. Usually Yes, No, Support, Oppose or Comment (that last meaning you want to avoid being seen as casting a !vote). If you are addressing a specific editor's comment, please indent your comment sufficiently that it's obvious which comment you are addressing. And please do not address the entire RFC more than once. If you have to revise your comments later on, please do so at your original comment, striking out (like this ) your previous comment. Tarl N. ( discuss ) 01:51, 24 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Hard pass, notability has a vague boundary and an even vaguer definition...PNSMurthy (talk) 01:02, 24 July 2020 (UTC)

Shall we get to a result now? Or more Comments? I suggest More Comments so we can get to a Consensus on whether or not we shall Merge or Keep. --THE COLOSSAL GALAXY NAMED IC1101 (talk) 15:39, 25 July 2020 (UTC)

It seems obvious that the overall consensus is that no one wants to merge the articles.PNSMurthy (talk) 02:24, 26 July 2020 (UTC)