Cosmic 'Dig' Reveals Vestiges of the Milky Way's Building Blocks
Wednesday, November 25, 2009 - 13:36
in Astronomy & Space
(PhysOrg.com) -- Peering through the thick dust clouds of our galaxy's "bulge" (the myriads of stars surrounding its center), a team of astronomers has unveiled an unusual mix of stars in the stellar grouping known as Terzan 5. Never observed anywhere in the bulge before, this peculiar "cocktail" of stars suggests that Terzan 5 is in fact one of the bulge's primordial building blocks, most likely the relic of a dwarf galaxy that merged with the Milky Way during its very early days.