The galactic neighborhood

The Milky Way, the Andromeda Galaxy and the Triangulum Galaxy are the major members of the Local Group, a group of some 35 closely bound galaxies; the Local Group is part of the Virgo Supercluster.The Milky Way is orbited by a number of dwarf galaxies in the Local Group. The largest of these is the Large Magellanic Cloud with a diameter of 20,000 light years. The smallest, Carina Dwarf, Draco Dwarf, and Leo II Dwarf are only 500 light years in diameter. The other dwarfs orbiting our galaxy are the Small Magellanic Cloud; Canis Major Dwarf, the closest; Sagittarius Dwarf Elliptical Galaxy, previously thought to be the closest; Ursa Minor Dwarf; Sculptor Dwarf, Sextans Dwarf, Fornax Dwarf, and Leo I Dwarf.In January 2006, researchers reported that the heretofore unexplained warp in the disk of the Milky Way has now been mapped and found to be a ripple or vibration set up by the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds as they circle the Milky Way, causing vibrations at certain frequencies when they pass through the edges of our Galaxy. Previously, these two galaxies, at around 2% of the mass of the Milky Way, were considered too small to influence the Milky Way. However, by taking into account dark matter, the movement of these two galaxies creates a wake that influences the larger Milky Way. Taking dark matter into account results in an approximately twenty-fold increase in mass for the Milky Way. This calculation is according to a computer model made by Martin Weinberg of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. In this model, the dark matter is spreading out from the Milky Way disk with the known gas layer. As a result, the model predicts that the gravitational impact of the Magellanic Clouds is amplified as they pass through the Milky Way.