A mysterious galaxy called ‘Kraken’ crashed into the Milky Way

The family tree of the Milky Way galaxy has been revealed by scientists, showing how the mass of stars came together and discovering a mysterious galaxy that could have crashed into the Milky Way that scientists did not know about.

The Milky Way is comprised of hundreds of millions of stars, collected into more than 150 ‘global clusters’ which come together to make up the galaxy.

Scientists have suspected that older clusters could be used to reconstruct how they merged with other ones, and therefore shed light on the history of the cosmos.

Using computer simulations called E-MOSAICS, which include a complete model for how clusters form, change, and are eventually destroyed, an international team of researchers were able to infer how the clusters would have come together to form the Milky Way.