The Triangulum Galaxy, catalogued as Messier 33 or NGC 598, is a spiral galaxy located 2.73 million light years away from Earth in the constellation Triangulum.
It is occasionally referred to as and confused with the Pinwheel Galaxy, but the SIMBAD Database indicates that is a separate galaxy, Messier 101.
Properties[]
The Triangulum Galaxy has a diameter of around 60,000 light years, which makes it the third largest member of the Local Group of galaxies (roughly 60% the size of the Milky Way). The Triangulum Galaxy is home to approximately 40 billion stars compared to 400 billion in the Milky Way and 1 trillion in the Andromeda Galaxy.
After the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies, the Triangulum galaxy ranks as the third-largest Local Group member. Its diameter is about 50,000 light-years, or about one-half that of our Milky Way.
Future[]
It is known that the Andromeda galaxy is moving toward our Milky Way and that a collision between the two galaxies will occur some 4 billion years from now. Although, the fate of the Triangulum Galaxy isn’t known for certain. It might someday be torn apart and absorbed by the Andromeda galaxy. It might participate in the collision between the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies.