In: Physics
what does the structure of our galaxy tell us about how our galaxy formed?
We know that our galaxy is a type of spiral galaxy with arms extending into the space. It is believed that at some point in time, the gas cloud began to collapse in the same way that the clouds which formed individual stars also condensed. Initially, some stars may have formed as the gas cloud began to fragment around the edges, with each fragment condensing further to form a star or group of stars. Because the cloud was spherical at that time, we do see some very old stars distributed in a spherical area around the outside of the galaxy today. These clouds were mainly composed of hydrogen and helium
The cloud continued to collapase, with more and more stars being formed as it did so. Since the cloud was rotating, the spherical shape began to flatten out into a disc, and the stars which were formed at this time filled the disc regions. we see this shape today in the main body of the galaxy.