Outrider Posted March 20, 2018 Posted March 20, 2018 Yes according to François Hammer Et Al. it is very possible that Andromeda (as we know it) formed over a billion years after our own solar system did. A French and Chinese collaboration of scientists made deep observations between 2008 and 2014 and came up with a numerical model. They fed the model into some of the most powerful computers in France and got back a simulation that produces a galaxy that is a dead ringer for Andromeda. Their hypothesis is that between 7 and 10 billion years ago a much larger galaxy collided with a smaller one. The merger finally settled into the configuration we know (and love) between 1.8 and 3 billion years ago. https://www.obspm.fr/the-formation-of-the.html?lang=en Quote 7 to 10 billion years ago, instead of Andromeda, there were two galaxies on an encountering orbit. The astronomers optimized by simulations the trajectories of both galaxies. They discovered that they had finally merged 1.8 to 3 billion years ago. This collision gave birth to Andromeda, as we know it. "We showed that the biggest of both parent galaxies was approximately four times as massive as the smallest ", specifies François Hammer, astronomer of the Paris Observatory - PSL, first co-author of the study. Snip Thanks to intensive numerical calculations, the astrophysicists succeed for the first time in reproducing in detail all the numerous structures that compose the Andromeda galaxy: the bulge, the bar and the huge disk. The latter includes a gigantic ring of young stars, which stability with time remained unexplained, which has then been solved. Snip Collaboration The team includes François Hammer (Observatoire de Paris – PSL), Yanbin Yang (Observatoire de Paris – PSL), Jianling Wang (National Astronomical Observatory of China), Rodrigo Ibata (Observatoire astronomique de l’Université de Strasbourg), Hector Flores (Observatoire de Paris – PSL) and Mathieu Puech (Observatoire de Paris – PSL). BTW there are clips of the simulation at the link. I didn't watch them there instead I watched them on Anton Petrov's Youtube channel "What Da Math". Thanks Anton. And yes. It is popsci but IMO it is very well done. Also PBS has some entertaining and informative channels (again my opinion) out there. Sci show and Eons being 2 of them. Heres the vid if you would like to watch.
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