Astronomers report that they have solved a major problem that has plagued their understanding of how the universe is changing, which is the spatial distribution of faint moon galaxies around the Milky Way.
Satellite galaxies show an unusual resolution that makes them appear to be in very slow motion called the “satellite plane”.
This seemingly dubious system has baffled astronomers for more than 50 years, leading many to wonder if the universe is compatible with the way things are today.
Now, a new study led by Durham Universities in the UK and Helsinki in Finland has found that the periodic distribution of moon galaxies, or orbits of the moon, around the Milky Way is astronomical and will collapse over time. In the same way the constellations changed.
This research removes problems caused by gambling in the Standard Model of cosmology.
This model explains how the universe formed and how the galaxies we see today slowly formed in cold dark matter – the mysterious substance that makes up about 27% of the universe.
The results have been published in the journal Nature Astronomy. The moons of the Milky Way seem to have formed in a very thin plane that runs through the galaxy, and strangely enough, they also rotate in a compact disk that has been around for a long time.
There is no known mechanism that makes the Moon round, but it was thought that the Moon’s galaxies must be arranged in a circular pattern in order to see dark matter.
Since the moon’s rotation began in the 1970s, astronomers have tried, but failed, to find similar objects in the supercomputers that track the evolution of the universe from the Big Bang to the present day.
The fact that the structure of the Moon’s galaxy has not been explained has led the researchers to believe that the theory of galaxy formation may be wrong.
The astronomers used new data from the European Space Agency’s Gaia space observatory. Gaia creates a six-dimensional map of the Milky Way, providing the exact location and motion measurements of nearly a billion stars in our galaxy (about 1% of the total) and their associated systems.
This data has helped scientists show how past and future galaxies move and see how the plane rotates and disappears within a few hundred million years, which is just a blink of an eye in the time of the universe.
Scientists also looked for new astronomical simulations specifically designed to find evidence of the moon’s rotation.
They discovered that previous studies based on simulations were misled by not taking into account the moons’ distance from the galactic center, making the satellite system appear more round than it actually is.
With that in mind, he discovered a number of hypothetical galaxies called the Milky Ways that have satellite galaxies very similar to those seen with telescopes.
Scientists say this means the concept of dark matter remains a cornerstone of our understanding of the universe.
Professor Carlos Frink, Professor of Fundamental Physics in the Institute for Computational Cosmology at Durham University, explained: “Thanks to the data from the Gaia Observatory and the laws of physics, we now know that the rotation is purely a fluke. And it’s a matter of being in the right place at the right time, just like that. “Like the constellations in the sky…the most reliable story of the evolution of our universe.”
The lead author of the study, Dr. Til Swala from the University of Helsinki added: “The continuous rotation of the moon was really amazing. And an international team to work together. “