Turkish astronomers find four hidden galaxy remnants in Milky Way

ANKARA (MNTV) — Scientists in Türkiye have identified the remnants of four previously unknown dwarf galaxies — small galaxies later swallowed by a larger one — and a disrupted star cluster hidden within the Milky Way, shedding new light on how our galaxy formed.

The discovery, led by astronomers at Istanbul University, was published in the Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, a peer-reviewed journal. 

It shows how artificial intelligence and large-scale data analysis are transforming the study of galaxies. Combining observations from the European Space Agency’s Gaia satellite with data from the SDSS-V sky survey, the team detected ancient stellar structures hidden in the crowded Milky Way.

The researchers — Olcay Plevne and doctoral student Furkan Akbaba, funded by Türkiye’s national science agency TÜBİTAK — analyzed data from about 1.4 million stars, combining their chemical makeup with their orbits. Plevne likened the work to analyzing the “DNA” of the Milky Way, tracing the remains of smaller galaxies absorbed over billions of years.

Machine-learning models first correctly identified all 15 previously known dwarf-galaxy remnants, confirming the method’s accuracy, then revealed four more plus a disrupted globular cluster — a dense ball of stars — with a distinct chemical signature. 

The findings raise the known count of such remnants in the Milky Way from 15 to 19, offering clues about how large galaxies grow by absorbing smaller ones. Researchers say further observations are needed to determine the remnants’ ages and when they merged.