as in world
a huge physical or conceptual distance
my sister and I are close in age, but personality-wise, there are light-years between us
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Recent Examples of light-year
Lopez, for instance, has discovered a beast called the Giant Arc—a curve of galaxies strung across some 3.3 billion light-years.
—
Sarah Scoles, Scientific American, 1 Jan. 2025
This new image from the James Webb Space Telescope features the young star cluster NGC 602, surrounded by the varied clouds of a nebula, near the outskirts of the Small Magellanic Cloud, about 200,000 light-years from Earth.
—Alan Taylor, The Atlantic, 24 Dec. 2024
Located roughly 150 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Serpens, UGC 10043 is one of the somewhat rare spiral galaxies that are seen edge-on.
—Alan Taylor, The Atlantic, 22 Dec. 2024
Late last year, two of the most powerful space telescopes in the universe joined forces to highlight colorful galaxy clusters about 4.3 billion light-years away from Earth.
—Laura Baisas, Popular Science, 20 Dec. 2024
See all Example Sentences for light-year 
Sarah Scoles, Scientific American, 1 Jan. 2025
This new image from the James Webb Space Telescope features the young star cluster NGC 602, surrounded by the varied clouds of a nebula, near the outskirts of the Small Magellanic Cloud, about 200,000 light-years from Earth.
—Alan Taylor, The Atlantic, 24 Dec. 2024
Located roughly 150 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Serpens, UGC 10043 is one of the somewhat rare spiral galaxies that are seen edge-on.
—Alan Taylor, The Atlantic, 22 Dec. 2024
Late last year, two of the most powerful space telescopes in the universe joined forces to highlight colorful galaxy clusters about 4.3 billion light-years away from Earth.
—Laura Baisas, Popular Science, 20 Dec. 2024
See all Example Sentences for light-year
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Cite this Entry
“Light-year.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/light-year. Accessed 20 Jan. 2025.
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