preview

Milky Way Compare And Contrast

Better Essays

In about 4 billion years, the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies will collide. The two neighbouring galaxies are located in a collection of other galaxies acknowledged as the local group. This group contains more than 50 galaxies, with a majority of them being dwarf galaxies. The largest and most massive of galaxies are the Milky Way, Andromeda, and the Triangulum galaxy. All three of these have a gathering of satellite galaxies surrounding them. Just like how planets orbit around the sun, these smaller galaxies contain billions of stars and orbit around the galaxy’s center. The satellite galaxies orbit these larger galaxies due to the great gravitational attraction the larger galaxies emit.

The Milky Way galaxy has an assortment of approximately 30 satellite galaxies which include Sagittarius Dwarf Galaxy, Large Magellanic Cloud, and Small Magellanic Cloud, just to name a few. The Andromeda galaxy has about 15 satellite galaxies, and the Traingulum galaxy has the Pisces Dwarf as a …show more content…

The galaxy contains the Solar System, with more than 200 billion stars and at least 100 billion planets. The name “milky” comes from the dim disk-like appearance the galaxy has when observed in the night sky. It is a barred spiral galaxy with four major arms and a diameter of 220 000 light-years. The mass of the Milky Way is approximately more than 400 solar masses. The center, Sagittarius A, is located about 26 000 light-years from Earth and contains a supermassive black hole. The other galaxy involved in the future collision is the Andromeda galaxy, or M31. There are about 1 trillion stars and could possibly contain more dark matter than the Milky Way. Its name comes from the constellation of Andromeda, which originated from the mythological princes Andromeda. It is a spiral type galaxy with at least two spiral arms and a diameter of 260 000 light-years. The mass of Andromeda is approximately 400 billion solar masses.

Get Access