What is a Stellar Stream?
A stellar stream is created when stars from one galaxy get pulled from their home galaxy by another. The stellar stream is a long thin filament of stars produced by the stretching action of tidal forces. Only about a dozen stellar streams have been named or studied in detail. Being a phenomena which only occurs on a galactic scale, most stellar streams are too faint and distant to study very thoroughly. The most familiar stellar stream and one of the first to be confirmed as such is the Arcturus stream, located only 37 light-years away, containing the star Arcturus. The Arcturus stream is a remnant of a dwarf galaxy devoured long ago by the Milky Way. Over its lifetime, the Milky Way has probably consumed dozens or even hundreds of smaller dwarf galaxies, and continues to do so today. We even observe star clusters that seem to be remnants of the cores of devoured galaxies, such as the Omega Centauri star cluster. We know these are former galactic cores and not conventional open cluster
