Astronomers uncover galaxy 150 times bigger than the Milky Way

Researchers at the Leiden Observatory christened their new discovery Alcyoneus, which is a whopping 3 billion light-years away from Earth and is thought to be 16.3 million light-years long, which is 153 times bigger than our galaxy, which measures 106,000 light-years away.

When explaining why their finding is so important, Martijn Oei from the Leiden labelled it as a ‘radio galaxy’, believed to be a result of a super massive black hole.

He said: “If there exist host galaxy characteristics that are an important cause for giant radio galaxy growth, then the hosts of the largest giant radio galaxies are likely to possess them.”

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