noun
- a unit of astronomical distance equal to one million parsecs, used to measure very large distances in space
Usage: astronomy
Examples
- The Andromeda Galaxy is approximately 0.78 megaparsecs away from Earth.
- Astronomers use megaparsecs to measure distances between galaxies.
- The observable universe has a radius of about 14,000 megaparsecs.
- Galaxy clusters can span several megaparsecs across.
- The distance to the Virgo Cluster is roughly 16.5 megaparsecs.
- Cosmologists often express intergalactic distances in megaparsecs.