Are galaxies just moving away or they are increasing in size also?

Question

According to the big bang theory the universe is expanding and the galaxies are moving away from each other. Are these galaxies increasing in size also i.e. are they themselves expanding from their respectve centers also? If they are increasing in size then there would have been small "Bangs" at their centers and if they are not increasing in size then all the galaxies must have evolved at the same time and the force of the big bang is directed towards the centers of the galaxies.

Answer 1

both

Answer 2

expansion of space is the averaged increase of metric (i.e. measured) distance between objects in the universe with time. It is an intrinsic expansion—that is, it is defined by the relative separation of parts of the universe and not by motion "outward" into preexisting space

but

At smaller scales matter has clumped together under the influence of gravitational attraction and these clumps do not individually expand, though they continue to recede from one another,

that answers ur question

Answer 3

galaxies are moving away and they are increasing in size

Answer 4

On average, they are spreading apart and moving away from each other.  When they collide, they often merge.  Isolated galaxies grow or shrink according to the forces at work within them, independent of the expansion of the universe.  The main influences are gravity, conservation of angular momentum, and radiation of energy (therefore reducing mass).  Mature galaxies would generally be shrinking very very slowly.

The galaxies are not believed to have formed at the same time.

Answer 5

Galaxies are moving apart or getting shrunked into a black hole.  So we ought to have no problems as it takes billions of years for earth to become a part of black hole.

Answer 6

yeh but andromeda is heading towards us

Answer 7

as universe is expanding,the galaxies are moving apart.The collision i. e. big or small BANGS are allways there.But the total mass content or energy content of the UNIVERSE is constant.Accordingly, galaxies are either increasing or decreasing in size.

Answer 8

The 'big bang" theory does not mean that we are moving from a center location. It is not an easy concept to grasp, but he best analogy is that of the way a balloon's surface expands when a balloon is inflated. The difficult part to comprehend is that in this analogy, our three dimensional space is the surface of the balloon. But since the balloon is inflating, points on the surface of the balloon that are further from each other are moving away from each other faster, since there is more balloon between them to stretch.

As the balloon inflates, every stationary thing gets further from everything else, but things can still move on this surface. And so even with the expansion of the universe, some galaxies and even galaxy clusters can be moving closer to other nearby galaxy clusters. But on average, and certainly over longer distances - as I explained above -  the distance would increase.

Since space itself is expanding, the space within galaxies is also expanding, but again , there is no sense of an original center. They do not expand 'outwards', they ...um... inflate. It takes some thinking about to begin to get a hint of it.

It is useful to realize that while this expansion is observable over the vast distances of intergalactic space, it is not noticeable at the relatively tiny scales (!) of our solar system, or even very detectable in our own galaxy

Hope this helps...