AS102 Study Guide - Midterm Guide: Local Group
Document Summary
Galaxies are not scattered randomly throughout the universe but are found in clusters. A cluster is said to be rich or poor depending on how many galaxies it contains. Our milky way galaxy belongs to a cluster called the. Local group mainly because it is a poor cluster containing relatively few galaxies. The map (see below) shows part of the local group. The map shows these galaxies on a 2d plane but keep in mind that our local group is naturally a 3d grouping of galaxies. The expanded inset attempts to show inner part of the local group in 3d. The andromeda galaxy (m31) is the largest and most massive galaxy in the. The sagittarius dwarf is the closest to us and yet was first observed just only a few years ago, in 1994. Measuring the distances to galaxies is truly a very challenging undertaking. Remember that we are talking about the largest distances in the universe.
