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Astrophysics

Tracking our neighbours' past

Nature volume 504, pages 226–227 (2013)Cite this article

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The collective motions of dwarf galaxies in planes around the Andromeda galaxy and the Milky Way have presented a challenge to theory. Interactions between galaxy groups in the distant past may have left their imprint on these dwarfs.

The same theory that has shown so much success in predicting the large-scale properties of the Universe — for example, the cosmic microwave background radiation that permeates the whole of space, detected in fine detail by the Planck satellite earlier this year4 — also makes predictions about how dwarf galaxies form. The expectation is that they do so essentially independently of each other. So it came as a surprise when it was reported in January1 that many of the dwarfs around Andromeda move as a group, mapping out a giant, rotating, thin disk that is viewed nearly edge on from Earth. This arrangement seems to be similar to that shown by the Milky Way's dwarfs2.

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Figure 1

JEAN-CHARLES CUILLANDRE & GIOVANNI ANSELMI/CFHT/COELUM

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  1. Alan McConnachie is at the NRC Herzberg Institute of Astrophysics, Dominion Astrophysical Observatory, Victoria, British Columbia V9E 2E7, Canada.,

    Alan McConnachie

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  1. Alan McConnachie
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Correspondence to Alan McConnachie.

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McConnachie, A. Tracking our neighbours' past. Nature 504, 226–227 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/504226a

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