Andromeda Galaxy

The Andromeda Galaxy is our closest neighbor in intergalactic space.  It is approximately 2 million light years away.  Andromeda was one of the first galaxies studied because it is also the brightest, appearing to the naked eye on a clear night far far FAR away from city lights as a faint oval cloud in the constellation Andromeda. Like the Milky Way, Andromeda has a large spiral disk, a central bulge, globular clusters, a couple of satellite galaxies and several hundred billion stars.