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Undo revision 891446 by FergusE (talk)Please respect the fact the the distances are NOT in question by anyone - including creationists
[[Image:M31.jpg|right|thumb|Messier 31 (Andromeda)]]
[[Image:M31.jpg|right|thumb|Messier 31 (Andromeda)]]
The '''Andromeda Galaxy''', ''M31,'' is a large [[spiral galaxy]], the nearest one to the [[Milky Way]], and situated within the same [[galactic cluster]] called the [[Local Group]]. It appears to be within the constellation [[Andromeda (constellation)|Andromeda]].
The '''Andromeda Galaxy''', ''M31,'' is a large [[spiral galaxy]], the nearest one to the [[Milky Way]], and situated within the same [[galactic cluster]] called the [[Local Group]]. It appears to be within the constellation [[Andromeda (constellation)|Andromeda]].
It is situated about 2.51 ± 0.13 million light years from the Milky Way, and the galaxies are on course to collide sometime in about 3 to 5 billion years.<ref>http://space.newscientist.com/article/dn7916</ref><ref>http://www.cita.utoronto.ca/~dubinski/tflops/tflops/</ref>
The distance of 2.51 million light years has been reached through three separate methods for determining the distance to an astronomical object.
# [[Cepheid variable]]s
# Eclipsing [[binary star]]<ref>http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2005ApJ...635L..37R</ref>
# Measurement of brightness of individual stars and comparing to the distance to the [[Magellanic Clouds]]
The name "M31" is an abbreviation for "Messier 31," the thirty-first object in Charles Messier's (1730-1817) pioneering catalog of nebulae.
The name "M31" is an abbreviation for "Messier 31," the thirty-first object in Charles Messier's (1730-1817) pioneering catalog of nebulae.