Shockingly Tiny Galaxy Near Andromeda Is Just One-Millionth the Size of the Milky Way

A group of astronomers has discovered the smallest, dimmest satellite galaxy bordering the Milky Way’s nearest galactic neighbor, the Andromeda Galaxy. The itsy-bitsy satellite galaxy is named Andromeda XXXV and sits about 3 million light-years from Earth. The discovery of the galaxy gives astronomers a useful comparative tool for studying satellite galaxies on the outskirts of our own galaxy, the Milky Way. The team’s findings were published this week in The Astrophysical Journal Letters. “It’s like having a perfectly functional human being that’s the size of a grain of rice.” “These are fully functional galaxies, but they’re about a millionth of the size of the Milky Way,” said Eric Bell, an astronomer at the University of Michigan and senior author of the study, in a university release. “It’s like having a perfectly functional human being that’s the size of a grain of rice.” Andromeda XXXV is only about 20,000 times more massive than our Sun—very small, even for a satellite gala ... Read full article.