Great Attractor

Also found in: Thesaurus, Encyclopedia, Wikipedia.

Great Attractor

(Astronomy) astronomy a large mass, possibly a gigantic cluster of galaxies, postulated to explain the fact that many galaxies appear to be moving towards a particular point in the sky

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014

Great′ Attrac′tor

a vast concentration of matter whose gravitational pull alters the direction and speed of the Milky Way and other galaxies as they spread apart in the expanding universe posited by the big bang theory.

[1985–90]

ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:

Switch to new thesaurus

Noun

Great Attractor - a massive grouping of galaxies in the direction of Centaurus and Hydra whose gravitational attraction is believed to cause deviations in the paths of other galaxies

extragalactic nebula, galaxy - (astronomy) a collection of star systems; any of the billions of systems each having many stars and nebulae and dust; "`extragalactic nebula' is a former name for `galaxy'"

Translations

grande attrattore

Mentioned in ?

References in periodicals archive ?

In particular, the maps show that the region near the proposed Great Attractor has about twice the density of other regions.

A river runs through it? Mapping the flow of the universe

The Great Attractor is a central valley in this newly demarcated watershed.

Laniakea: our home supercluster

The gold-headed fly is a great attractor and by letting it fish deep it will catch the grayling especially when there is frost about.

Gym sessions help French team muscle in on victory; But isn't a sergeant-major approach to coaching going just a bit too far?

Prof Kraan-Korteweg and Dr Woudt jointly published a popular article on the Great Attractor in the South African Journal Quest.

University of Cape Town: Astronomy Department--2007 annual report

The other tug comes from a grander gathering of more distant galaxies in a direction nearly perpendicular to Virgo--the Great Attractor and, beyond it, the Shapley Concentration.

The VOID: Next Door: An enormous region of near-emptiness starts on our doorstep, giving astronomers their best chance to probe one of these gigantic cosmic structures

Astronomers had long assumed that our galaxy's race through space was due to the gravitational pull exerted by two dense regions of the universe - the Great Attractor, which is a region of a half dozen clusters of galaxies about 150 million light-years from the Milky Way, and the Shapley Concentration, an area of over two dozen clusters, located 600 million light-years beyond the Great Attractor. 

A Massive Void Is Pushing Us Through Space

"The fact that Henderson State is a COPLAC [Council of Public Liberal Arts Colleges] school was a great attractor," Miller said.

Super mover: a closer look behind a prominent promotion

This study also clarifies the role of the Great Attractor, a gravitational focal point in intergalactic space that influences the motion of our Local Group of galaxies and other galaxy clusters.

Milky Way Part of Huge Supercluster of Galaxies

Creators--Intelli-gensius Anarchus, The Great Attractor and Rick B--provide the site with an edgy feel.

Art talk

Well, as the article explains, it turns out that there is a region of the universe called the "Great Attractor," which is a region of space in the Centaurus Supercluster, which encompasses a mass tens of thousands of times greater than our own Milky Way galaxy.

Are you travelling at one million miles an hour? You might be surprised to know you are

The famous open cluster NGC 6025, because of its position close to The Great Attractor, is a typical stringy grouping.

The useful triangle

Wolfe: In astrophysics, there is a notion that somewhere there is a huge force of gravity called "The Great Attractor," and a bunch of galaxies are all caught in that force.