The Local Bubble and the Galactic Neighborhood
What surrounds the Sun in this neck of the Milky Way Galaxy ? Our current best guess is depicted in the above map of the surrounding 1500 light year s constructed from various observations and deductions . Currently, the Sun is passing through a Local Interstellar Cloud (LIC), shown in violet, which is flowing away from the Scorpius-Centaurus Association of young stars. The LIC resides in a low-density hole in the interstellar medium (ISM) called the Local Bubble , shown in black. Nearby, high-density molecular clouds including the Aquila Rift surround star forming regions, each shown in orange. The Gum Nebula , shown in green, is a region of hot ionized hydrogen gas. Inside the Gum Nebula is the Vela Supernova Remnant , shown in pink, which is expanding to create fragmented shells of material like the LIC . Future observations should help astronomers discern more about the local Galactic Neighborhood and how it might have affected Earth's past climate .