Spectrum of a “radio galaxy” taken by the Hale’s telescope in 1962.

The two little rows in the center of the plate are comparison spectra. The galaxy spectrum is an even tinier smudge between them.

the-science-llama:

Our Night Sky When We Collide With Andromeda

In the photos above in order:

— Present day
— 2 Billion years from now the of the approaching Andromeda galaxy is noticeably larger
— 3.75 Billion years, Andromeda fills the field of view
— 3.85 Billion years, the sky is ablaze with new star formation
— 3.9 Billion years, star formation continues
— 4 Billion years, Milky Way is warped and Andromeda is tidally stretched
— 5.1 Billion years, cores of both galaxies appear as a pair of globes
— 7 Billion years, the cores have merged, the bright core dominates the night sky

Here is an animation of the collision

In around 4 billion years our galaxy, The Milky Way, will collide with our neighbor galaxy Andromeda or M31. You might think this will be a catastrophic event for everything in the galaxy »