Search This Blog

Saturday 27 August 2011

Andromeda

The Andromeda Galaxy is a spiral galaxy 2.2 million light years away from Earth in the constellation of Andromeda, and the most distant object visible to the naked eye.


Andromeda is similar in nature to our own Milky Way, but contains about twice as many stars. It is about 200,000 light years across and is the largest member of the Local Group of galaxies.

Andromeda is approaching the Milky Way Galaxy at an estimated 270,000 mph. It’s another four billion years before they hit each other.

In 4 billion years the Andromeda galaxy will take up much of the Earth’s night sky as it nears our galaxy for collision.

When the Andromeda galaxy and the Milky Way collide in four billion years time, the probability even just two stars colliding is negligible.

No comments:

Post a Comment