Merging Spiral Galaxies - simulating visual appearance

[mantissa128]

When they first collide, there's a whip of stars that flies off into space... imagine being on a world round a sun that's being flung out of your galaxy. You would have to move, or give up ever visiting another star. And the galaxy on the right, as the black hole centre swallows a few large clumps of stars and gas - all those planets, gone. Or being cooked alive by the radiation from 1,000,000+ degree interstellar gas.

Andromeda is coming. We have 3 to 5 billion years to get off this planet.

[skraptube]

I wish there were an HD version! I feel like I'm missing a lot of the beauty due to the video compression. Nevertheless, many thanks for posting!

[mantissa128]

@skraptube Go to the poster's homepage for HD versions.

[skraptube]

@mantissa128 Thanks!

[vatefsly]

I wonder : what's the percentage of stars that would be ejected from this cataclysm ? We can see some of the stars seem to go pretty far from the center(s) then come back, but I guess part of them will become "ronin" stars, no ?

[MegaKiller1020]

universe FTW!!

[monmarfori]

Music has virus.

[letsgoforajoyride]

norway and china anyone

[BINLADENINDAHOUSE]

Love this simulations. . . they´re great.

[arm2armcos]

Fantastic!!!

5 stars!!!

[whose22]

Glory to Allah, this is how you Infedels will all die.

[letsgoforajoyride]

learn how to spell infidel genius

[nickharvey7]

Beautiful it was like a dance!!

[davidmartin7777]

Very cool, glad (per the author) that this not an extinction level for all involved.

[LOVS2SPOOG]

This is the most beautiful thing as if these two giant forces were dancing and in love. Gravity is amazing Those colors (percieved by the human eye) lol are incredible. loved it

[TheReasonWhyGuy]

This simulation shines more light on the potential cause of the dwarf galaxies orbiting ours.

This of coarse is just speculation on similar origin.

[tekkenhalo]

Wow the universe is amazing.

[kingofschnitzels]

wow... just imagine if one of those was OUR galaxy...

[theillestgreek]

I`ve read that our galaxy is on a collision course with the Andromeda Galaxy. I think the Sun will have swallowed Earth by then though. Basically, we need a paddle.

[ddillybar1]

It will be in about 3 billion years when we collide with Andromeda.

[andydiamos]

I'd also like to know what song this is. I'd be very interested in finding the music.

[lutorm]

I've added the source of the song to the movie description.

[eXcommunicate1979]

What if the large and small Magellanic Clouds are remnants of two galaxies merging into one, forming our current Milky Way Galaxy?

[PonThePony]

What song is this?

[lutorm]

I've added the source of the song to the movie description.

[Cerberus889]

Amazing...

[26dano]

galaxies are just riiples in the sea.

[funnyblackmans]

i think that a star is bound to hit another star in a galaxy crash. it would be like double as stuffed with stars as it is now

[lutorm]

But stare are not tightly packed. If you imagine the Sun being a 1" ball, the next star would be about 500 miles away. That's a lot of empty space to go around.

[funnyblackmans]

true true. but still i think at LEAST 1 star is bound to hit another. and all gravity an shit will go mangled because of the other galaxies gravitional pull. it will akll fuck up .

sorry for my bad language

[Broan13]

Nope. If you do a calculation assuming evenly distributed stars in a galaxy over a normal galaxy size, and then calculate the cross section of collision, it would take several billion passes for 1 star to collide. If you add in gravity it would probably make this happen more frequently, so lets say 100 times, then its down to about 1-10 million passes before 2 stars collide.

[uoldphuk]

I love this video!

So when a galaxy merges with another, are we seeing planets and stars smashing into each other?

If so, what a horrific event to witness first hand on such a galactic level. Seeing galaxies collide for the first time totally craps on seeing the Deathstar do it's thing for the first time.

[lutorm]

Glad you liked it. The answer is no, the space between the stars in a galaxy that when they collide, the chance of a star actually hitting another star is miniscule. The galaxies mostly pass through each other (which you can kind of see in the movie) but are disrupted by their mutual gravity.

[uoldphuk]

What about the theory of our own moon being created from a planetary collision? Can you easily write off the idea that solar systems can't collide when galaxies are merging for the same space?

I respect your opinion as many others share the same view. I beg to differ though. Thanks for your comment.

[katiemcc89]

The theory of our own moon being created by a planetary collision has nothing to do with 2 galaxies colliding. I think they believe that Mars or another planet in our own solar system is what collided with the Earth. The distance from Earth to Mars is 5*10^7 km. The chances of 2 planets colliding from that distance is astronomically greater than the chances of 2 stars (an average of 5.4 lightyears apart, or 5.1*10^14 km--that's 10 million times longer!!) colliding.

[tekkenhalo]

lutorm, so no planets or stars would collide through a catastrophic event like that? How is that even possible, with billions of bodies flying right at each other?

[Alexio711]

Oh no, many star systems would collide, physicists and astronomers agree that if this collision happens to our galaxy (Which it will eventually with neighboring Andromeda), the only way our solar system could survive is if we were cast out on some of those long tidal arms after the impact. All the dense, inner systems are getting smashed together and thrown around violently, stars are colliding or flinging each other out of orbits... It's crazy. So yes, systems would inevitably collide.

[Alexio711]

Okay, maybe not individual stars would collide, but they would all at least be pulling and such with their gravity, it would be a major mess, nonetheless. Not to mention the galactic cores accelerating all those stars and such.