Milky Way flipped in collision with dwarf galaxy 10bn years ago, astronomers say
Summary
Astronomers found that about 10 billion years ago, the Milky Way collided head-on with a smaller galaxy called the Gaia Sausage. This crash flipped the Milky Way’s disc on its side and changed how stars move in its outer regions.Key Facts
- The Gaia Sausage was a dwarf galaxy that hit the Milky Way directly around 10 billion years ago.
- This collision tore apart the Gaia Sausage and added its stars to the Milky Way.
- The impact flipped the Milky Way’s disc by more than 90 degrees over hundreds of millions of years.
- Scientists used supercomputer simulations to study how such collisions affect galaxies.
- Stars in the Milky Way’s halo (a surrounding cloud of stars) rotate much slower than those in the main disc.
- The slow rotation in the halo is explained by the effects of the Gaia Sausage collision and the resulting disc flip.
- The Gaia spacecraft helped map the Milky Way and revealed stars with unusual orbits linked to the collision.
- Future major mergers are expected but will be less dramatic than the Gaia Sausage event.
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