Did You Know – Facts about Galaxies

1. The word galaxy comes from the Greek word for “milky”.
2. Some scientists think that most of the mass of a galaxy is made up of a mysterious substance called dark matter.
3. It is thought that there is a massive black hole in the center of galaxies.
4. The closest galaxy to the Milky Way is Andromeda, which is around 2.6 million light years away from us.
5. Many galaxies are more than 100,000 light years across in distance.
6. It takes over two hundred million years for the sun to orbit the center of the galaxy. This is called a galactic year.
7. A galaxy is a massive group of stars, star clusters, interstellar gas and dust, and dark matter which is all gravitationally bound together.
8. There are four galaxies that can be seen from Earth with the naked eye: the Milky Way, the Andromeda Galaxy, and the Small and Large Magellanic Clouds.
9. The idea of a galaxy was first realized by Thomas Wright in 1917.
10. The most common type of galaxies that we have found to date are dwarf elliptical galaxies.
11. The Hubble Space Telescope has been instrumental in us being able to study distant galaxies and understand about the different types of galaxies.