The Andromeda galaxy, the closest neighbour to our own Milky Way, has been growing by scooping up stars from smaller surrounding galaxies, a Canadian-led team of astronomers has found.

The astronomers found that Andromeda's gravity is pulling millions of stars away from its neighbour, the Triangulum galaxy, and calculate that in a few billions years, Andromeda could consume Triangulum completely.

The discovery comes as a result of the largest survey of a galaxy ever made, spanning nearly one million light years around Andromeda, a galaxy about 2.5 million light years away and visible to the naked eye. Triangulum is visible using a small telescope.