One galactic rotation or one galactic year, where our star circles the galaxy one time, is estimated at 225 - 250 million years. The yellow line in the galactic map below shows the path of our star during this circumnavigation of the galactic core.
The galactic year, also known as a cosmic year, is the duration of time required for the Sun to orbit once around the center of the Milky Way Galaxy. Estimates of the length of one orbit range from 225 to 250 million terrestrial years.
The Solar System is traveling at an average speed of 828,000 km/h (230 km/s) or 514,000 mph (143 mi/s) within its trajectory around the galactic center, [3] a speed at which an object could circumnavigate the Earth's equator in 2 minutes and 54 seconds; that speed corresponds to approximately one 1300th of the speed of light.
Furthermore, our sun should not be moving any closer to the center of the galaxy, nor should it be moving further away. Our current position in the galaxy has been determined by our relationship to the largest central core of our galaxy.
After monitoring stellar orbits around Sagittarius A* for 16 years, Gillessen et al. estimate the object's mass at 4.31 ± 0.38 million solar masses. The result was announced in 2008 and published in The Astrophysical Journal in 2009. [2]. Reinhard Genzel, team leader of the research, said the study has delivered "what is now considered to be the best empirical evidence that super-massive black holes do really exist. The stellar orbits in the Galactic Center show that the central mass concentration of four million solar masses must be a black hole, beyond any reasonable doubt." [24]
Our relationship to Sagittarius A, the super-massive black hole in the center of the galaxy has been established and unless that singularity changes, gaining a significant amount of new mass, or loses a significant mass by some unknown means, we will continue to move in relationship to that core mass, unwavering for millennia.
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