Our galaxy, the Milky Way, looks like is enlarging, according to a new research conducted by the scientists from the Institute of Astrophysics, in the Canary Islands. More exactly, it has been calculated that Milky Way is expanding with a velocity of 500 meters per second, which would mean that in 3 billion years, the Milky Way will increase by 5%.
Our Solar System is situated within one of the Milky Way’s arms that emerge from the central galactic disk as the Milky Way is, in fact, what astronomers call a spiral galaxy.
The Milky Way has, at the moment, a diameter of 100,000 light years, houses about 250 billion stars and is presenting huge volumes of interstellar gases and dust, all swirling and whirling under the gravity force.
The specific connection between the galactic elements and gravity forces defined the shape of Milky Way, which is a spiral galaxy. Different other connection and interaction of galactic elements and gravitational fields can determine irregular galaxies and elliptical galaxies.
The Milky Way is expanding with a velocity of 500 meters per second
The scientists at the Institute of Astrophysics, in the Canary Island, led by Cristina Martinez-Lombilla, measured that the Milky Way is expanding at approximately 500 meters per second, which is quite fast on a smaller scale but which for the Universe is nothing.
Thus, our galaxy is expanding at a slow but steady pace.
“The Milky Way is already quite large, but our work shows that at least the visible part of it is slowly increasing in size since the stars are formed on the outskirts of the galaxy, it will not be fast, but if you could travel in the time and observe the galaxy within 3,000 million years, would be 5% larger than today,” declared Cristina Martinez-Lombilla, the leader of the study.
Even though Milky Way is expanding with 500 meters per second and will be 5% larger in 3 billion years it will not matter much for it as it will collide with Andromeda Galaxy in 4 billion years and will both form one big galaxy with another form, size, and the number of stars.
