• Spiral – The spiral galaxies has a number of long arms that are spiraling around the center. In the center of the spiral galaxy is older stars while the arms are generally made of new stars.
• Barred spiral – This type of galaxies is similar to the spiral but has a long bar in the middle with spirals coming off the ends.
• Elliptical – A mass of stars clumped together in the shape of an elliptical disc.
• Irregular – Any other shaped galaxies is generally lumped into the category of irregular. It is thought that most irregular galaxies are formed by two of the other three types of galaxies crashing into each other.

Also Read: Milestones in Space Exploration

 Fun Facts about Galaxy

• The word galaxy comes from the Greek word for “milky”.
• Some scientists think that most of the mass of a galaxy is made up of a mysterious substance called dark matter.
• It is thought that there is a massive black hole in the center of galaxies.
• The closest galaxy to the Milky Way is Andromeda, which is around 2.6 million light years away from us.
• Many galaxies are more than 100,000 light years across in distance.
• It takes over two hundred million years for the sun to orbit the center of the galaxy. This is called a galactic year. A galaxy is a massive group of stars, star clusters, interstellar gas and dust, and dark matter which is all gravitationally bound together.
• There are four galaxies that can be seen from Earth with the naked eye: the Milky Way, the Andromeda Galaxy, and the Small and Large Magellanic Clouds.
• The idea of a galaxy was first realized by Thomas Wright in 1917.
• The most common type of galaxies that we have found to date are dwarf elliptical galaxies.
• The Hubble Space Telescope has been instrumental in us being able to study distant galaxies and understand about the different types of galaxies.

Don’t Miss:

Astronomy Terms

Facts about Constellations

Strange Astronomy Facts

 

Random Facts

• The fastest, most drastic temperature change ever recorded was a 49 °F (27 °C) rise in just two minutes.
• In Argentina, political parties have their own brands of beer.
• Paraguay’s president own a stolen car.
• In 2001, Argentina had 5 presidents in 10 days.
• Famous soccer player Mario Balotelli is an Italian, born to immigrants from Ghana, raised by a Jewish
  mother.
• If Texas were a nation, it would be the world’s 7th largest oil producer.
• Egypt is the most populated country in Middle East and has the world’s largest Arab population.
• Uranus was originally called “George’s Star”(Georgium Sidus).
• Corn can grow in multiple colours by mixing special seeds.
• The top six crops in the world, wheat, corn, rice, barley, sorghum, and soy, are all fruits in the
  botanical sense of the word.
• The world’s first underground park will be inaugurated in 2018 in New York.
• Pencil sales increased 700% in the year after Sudoku became popular.
• Humans can live unprotected in space for about 30 seconds if they don’t hold their breath.
• It would take the average person walking nonstop approximately 347 days to walk around the world
• Steve Jobs was awarded 141 new patents since his death.
• 20% of office coffee mugs contain fecal bacteria.
• The only thing left on Bill Gates’ bucket list is not to die.
• The founders of Adidas and Puma were both NAZI.
• The tallest man living is Sultan Kosen from Turkey, measuring 2.51 m or 8 ft 3 in.
• The day after tomorrow is called “Overmorrow.”
• Berlin is 9 times bigger than Paris and has more bridges than Venice
• Wal-mart parking lots alone take up roughly the size of Tampa, Florida.
•  Between 100 to 300 tonnes of cosmic dust enter the Earth‘s atmosphere each day.
• The heart symbol was first used to denote love in the 1250.
• The international telephone dialing code for Antarctica is 672.
• The elephant is the only animal with 4 knees.
• The opening ceremony for the 2012 Olympics had 965 drummers there.
• It is illegal to take Indian currency (rupees) out of India.
• India has one of the world’s highest rates of abortion.
• India is the world’s largest producer of dried beans, such as kidney beans and chickpeas. It also leads the world in banana exports; Brazil is second.
• India has the world’s largest movie industry, based in the city of Mumbai (known as the “City of Dreams”). The B in “Bollywood” comes from Bombay, the former name for Mumbai.