spiral galaxy

English - English

Definition of spiral galaxy in English English dictionary: A galaxy having a number of arms of younger stars that spiral out from the centre containing older ones; A galaxy exhibiting a central nucleus or barred structure from which extend curved arms of higher luminosity ― called also spiral nebula; A galaxy having a spiral structure; A galaxy consisting of a flattened rotating disk of young stars, a central bulge of generally older stars, and a surrounding halo of older stars and dense clusters of old stars called globular clusters The disk is prominent due to the presence of young, hot stars in a spiral pattern; A group of roughly stars, arranged with an ellipsoidal centre of old stars and a sparser thin disk of younger stars The core can be collisional, the disk is generally not; a highly flattened galaxy with a disk and a central bulge The disk has a spiral pattern with slightly more stars and gas than in the rest of the disk A slow, steady star formation rate means that they still have gas and dust left in them from which stars are still forming The star orbits are constrained to stay within a small distance from the mid-plane of the disk and have small eccentricities; large system of stars and interstellar matter having the shape of a flattened disk with outlying spiral arms; A galaxy with an obvious disk component containing gas; dust; hot, bright stars; and spiral arms; One of the three major classifications of galaxies; their characteristics include a plate-shaped disk containing spiral arms; A galaxy that contains a prominent central bulge and luminous arms of gas , dust, and young stars that wind out from the central nucleus in a spiral formation Our galaxy, the Milky Way, is a spiral galaxy; A galaxy with an obvious disk component containing gas; dust hot, bright stars; and spiral arms; a galaxy having a spiral structure; arms containing younger stars spiral out from old stars at the center; A type of galaxy in which many of the stars and nebulae lie in spiral arms
flocculent spiral galaxy: a spiral galaxy with discontinuous spiral arms