It has been suggested these features were caused by a merger with another galaxy[7] and, in fact, computer simulations show that NGC 7217 could have been a large lenticular galaxy that merged with one or two smaller gas-rich ones of late Hubble type becoming the spiral galaxy we see today.;[6] however right now this galaxy is isolated in space, with no nearby major companions.[6] More recent research, however, presents a somewhat different scenario in which NGC 7217's massive bulge and halo would have been formed in a merger and the disk formed later (and is still growing) either accreting gas from the intergalactic medium or smaller gas-rich galaxies, or most likely from a previously existing reserve.[8]