Massive void between galaxies?

[Roach]

I was watching 'No Mans Land' - SGA - today and McKay said that they, being on a Hive ship, is probably in the massive void between galaxies where there weren't any planets.....


Is there a void of empty space between galaxies? Or does one galaxy just end and another begin??

[DigiFluid]

I was watching 'No Mans Land' - SGA - today and McKay said that they, being on a Hive ship, is probably in the massive void between galaxies where there weren't any planets.....


Is there a void of empty space between galaxies? Or does one galaxy just end and another begin??

Yes.

[Sealurk]

I was watching 'No Mans Land' - SGA - today and McKay said that they, being on a Hive ship, is probably in the massive void between galaxies where there weren't any planets.....


Is there a void of empty space between galaxies? Or does one galaxy just end and another begin??

The Milky Way, our galaxy, is approximately 100,000 light years from one side to the other. The nearest full sized galaxy (Andromeda) is around two and a half million light years away. So they are some distance apart.

[The Prophet]

It's a lonely place.

[aretood2]

Is there random particles in the void? I mean could their be some sort of atomic or subatomic substances in between galaxies?

[The Prophet]

Is there random particles in the void? I mean could their be some sort of atomic or subatomic substances in between galaxies?

Yeah, I think you can find the odd thing around and about. There's the occasional Rogue Star floating about, such as Red Giants and planetary nebula.

[DigiFluid]

Indeed. But in terms of size, that's a little like finding a golf ball in the middle of an area the size of 100 empty football fields--insignificant to the point of being safely ignored.

[aretood2]

Indeed. But in terms of size, that's a little like finding a golf ball in the middle of an area the size of 100 empty football fields--insignificant to the point of being safely ignored.

I figured as much, But would it have been possible to place midway station beside a rogue star?

[DigiFluid]

I suppose that's possible, but for two problems.

For one, there's no guarantee the rogue star would be at the midway point. And two, not being firmly attached to the gravity well of either galaxy is what makes it a "rogue" star; which means it's moving.

Either of these cases makes a rogue star a poor candidate for a 'space base', to say nothing of the problems presented by the galactic spin of two galaxies altering the "home" point at either end while the "line" between stays where it is.

[aretood2]

I suppose that's possible, but for two problems.

For one, there's no guarantee the rogue star would be at the midway point. And two, not being firmly attached to the gravity well of either galaxy is what makes it a "rogue" star; which means it's moving.

Either of these cases makes a rogue star a poor candidate for a 'space base', to say nothing of the problems presented by the galactic spin of two galaxies altering the "home" point at either end while the "line" between stays where it is.

Wouldn't Midway suffer from these issues as well?

[DigiFluid]

Midway would indeed suffer from the 'galactic spin' problem, unless they managed to position the closest extra-galactic gates close enough to be dialed from within the galaxy and somehow managed to anchor them against the gravity of galactic rotation. This was never explicitly addressed, as far as I can remember.

[Inquisitor]

Think of it this way, if there' wasn't a void, why would we define multiple galaxies? So some astronomer must have discovered there would be voids.

As for the Midway station, I would suppose they would have had to install some kind of stabilisers and placed it at a point where gravity is minimal.

[Pharaoh Atem]

It's a lonely place.

as proven in bsg

[kymeric]

Theres hydrogen and helium "streamers" between the galaxies. Like a dust trail behind the galaxies. They kinda cross and combine depending on what the space theyre in are like. Im sure theres denser areas and near empty spaces. Its not really accurate to say its empty, there is matter there.

[Count]

There's a lot of stuff between galaxies in the void, but as described, it really is a needle in a haystack to find any of it.

You'll find rogue stars, protostar clusters, black holes, radiation clouds, nebulas and whatnot in the void but the reason there is a void is because galaxies have so much gravity that they attract everything into orbit around their centres. So anything you find in a void was thrown free of another galaxy due to either a collision/merger between galaxies, a star exploding or something similar that gave whatever you find, enough force to break free of the galaxy it belonged to.

The only thing you'll find at regular intervals anywhere in the galaxy is radiation, gamma and xrays, but they'll be more scarce in the void then they would inside a galaxy too because there are no regular concentrations of stars around you to generate the radiation.

As for the midway being put around a star, there's really no need for it, finding a star that would be situated right where they need it between galaxies would be astronomically small in terms of chance, it'd just be easier to build the station and bring power systems from earth to power the gate, even though the galaxies are moving fast, in relative terms, they wont be shifting much over the few hundred/thousand years that the station could potentially operate for so it's position would only need to be maintained by something simple like control thrusters.