|
G'day Vespine,
The LMC is known as a "dwarf irregular satellite galaxy". That just means it's small and lumpy in shape but the important bit is "satellite". The Milky Way being a rather large galaxy therefore has a fair amount of gravity. The LMC is gravitationaly bound to the Milky Way and is very very slowly colliding with us. The reason the LMC and the SMC are irregular in shape is because the Milky Way's gravity is distorting them.
The Andromeda Galaxy is a very large galaxy (bigger than us) and also a fair distance off compared to the LMC and SMC. The LMC/SMC are around 200,000 light years away whereas the Andromeda Galaxy is about 2.25 million light years away. So at that distance there is no way it could be a satellite galaxy to ours.
Peter.
|