- ID:
- ivo://CDS.VizieR/J/ApJ/885/3
- Title:
- Membership in 12 stellar streams from DES
- Short Name:
- J/ApJ/885/3
- Date:
- 16 Mar 2022 11:34:00
- Publisher:
- CDS
- Description:
- We cross-match high-precision astrometric data from Gaia DR2 with accurate multiband photometry from the Dark Energy Survey (DES) DR1 to confidently measure proper motions for nine stellar streams in the DES footprint: Aliqa Uma, ATLAS, Chenab, Elqui, Indus, Jhelum, Phoenix, Tucana III, and Turranburra. We determine low-confidence proper-motion measurements for four additional stellar streams: Ravi, Wambelong, Willka Yaku, and Turbio. We find evidence for a misalignment between stream tracks and the systemic proper motion of streams that may suggest a systematic gravitational influence from the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). These proper motions, when combined with radial velocity measurements, will allow for detailed orbit modeling that can be used to constrain properties of the LMC and its effect on nearby streams, as well as global properties of the Milky Way's gravitational potential.
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Search Results
- ID:
- ivo://CDS.VizieR/J/ApJ/838/11
- Title:
- Member stars in the MW satellite Tucana III
- Short Name:
- J/ApJ/838/11
- Date:
- 21 Oct 2021
- Publisher:
- CDS
- Description:
- We present Magellan/IMACS spectroscopy of the recently discovered Milky Way satellite Tucana III (Tuc III). We identify 26 member stars in Tuc III from which we measure a mean radial velocity of v_hel_=-102.3+/-0.4(stat.)+/-2.0(sys.)km/s, a velocity dispersion of 0.1_-0.1_^+0.7^km/s, and a mean metallicity of [Fe/H]=-2.42_-0.08_^+0.07^. The upper limit on the velocity dispersion is {sigma}<1.5km/s at 95.5% confidence, and the corresponding upper limit on the mass within the half-light radius of Tuc III is 9.0x10^4^M_{sun}_. We cannot rule out mass-to-light ratios as large as 240M_{sun}_/L_{sun}_ for Tuc III, but much lower mass-to-light ratios that would leave the system baryon-dominated are also allowed. We measure an upper limit on the metallicity spread of the stars in Tuc III of 0.19dex at 95.5% confidence. Tuc III has a smaller metallicity dispersion and likely a smaller velocity dispersion than any known dwarf galaxy, but a larger size and lower surface brightness than any known globular cluster. Its metallicity is also much lower than those of the clusters with similar luminosity. We therefore tentatively suggest that Tuc III is the tidally stripped remnant of a dark matter-dominated dwarf galaxy, but additional precise velocity and metallicity measurements will be necessary for a definitive classification. If Tuc III is indeed a dwarf galaxy, it is one of the closest external galaxies to the Sun. Because of its proximity, the most luminous stars in Tuc III are quite bright, including one star at V=15.7 that is the brightest known member star of an ultra-faint satellite.
- ID:
- ivo://CDS.VizieR/J/ApJ/692/511
- Title:
- Mergers of luminous early-type galaxies
- Short Name:
- J/ApJ/692/511
- Date:
- 21 Oct 2021
- Publisher:
- CDS
- Description:
- Supermassive black hole (SMBH) coalescence in galaxy mergers is believed to be one of the primary sources of very low frequency gravitational waves (GWs). Significant contribution of the GWs comes from mergers of massive galaxies with redshifts z<2. Very few previous studies gave the merger rate of massive galaxies. We selected a large sample (1209) of close pairs of galaxies with projected separations 7<r_p_<50kpc from 87889 luminous early-type galaxies (M_r_<-21.5) from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 6. These pairs constitute a complete volume-limited sample in the local universe (z<0.12). Using our newly developed technique, 249 mergers have been identified by searching for interaction features. From them, we found that the merger fraction of luminous early-type galaxies is 0.8%, and the merger rate in the local universe is Rg~(1.0+/-0.4)x10^-5^Mpc^-3^/Gyr with an uncertainty mainly depending on the merging timescale.
- ID:
- ivo://CDS.VizieR/J/ApJS/237/36
- Title:
- Merging dwarf galaxies in the local universe
- Short Name:
- J/ApJS/237/36
- Date:
- 21 Oct 2021
- Publisher:
- CDS
- Description:
- We present the largest publicly available catalog of interacting dwarf galaxies. It includes 177 nearby merging dwarf galaxies of stellar mass M*<10^10^M_{sun}_ and redshifts z<0.02. These galaxies are selected by visual inspection of publicly available archival imaging from two wide-field optical surveys (SDSS-III and the Legacy Survey), and they possess low-surface-brightness features that are likely the result of an interaction between dwarf galaxies. We list UV and optical photometric data that we use to estimate stellar masses and star formation rates. So far, the study of interacting dwarf galaxies has largely been done on an individual basis, and lacks a sufficiently large catalog to give statistics on the properties of interacting dwarf galaxies, and their role in the evolution of low-mass galaxies. We expect that this public catalog can be used as a reference sample to investigate the effects of the tidal interaction on the evolution of star formation, and the morphology/structure of dwarf galaxies. Our sample is overwhelmingly dominated by star-forming galaxies, and they are generally found significantly below the red sequence in the color-magnitude relation. The number of early-type galaxies is only 3 out of 177. We classify them, according to observed low-surface-brightness features, into various categories including shells, stellar streams, loops, antennae, or simply interacting. We find that dwarf-dwarf interactions tend to prefer the low-density environment. Only 41 out of the 177 candidate dwarf-dwarf interaction systems have giant neighbors within a sky-projected distance of 700kpc and a line-of-sight radial velocity range +/-700km/s, and compared to the LMC-SMC, they are generally located at much larger sky-projected distances from their nearest giant neighbors.
- ID:
- ivo://CDS.VizieR/J/A+A/600/A28
- Title:
- Merging galaxies in Pan-STARR
- Short Name:
- J/A+A/600/A28
- Date:
- 21 Oct 2021
- Publisher:
- CDS
- Description:
- We studied the r'-, z'-, and y'-band images of merging galaxies from the observations of the Panoramic Survey Telescope & Rapid Response System (Pan-STARRS). The merging galaxies were selected from our merging catalog that was created by checking the images of the Red-Sequence Cluster Survey 2 from the observations of the Canada France Hawaii Telescope By using the homomorphic-aperture, we determined the photometric results of these merging systems. To obtain accurate photometry, we calibrated the Pan-STARRS r'-, z'-, and y'-band data to match the results of Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 9. We also investigated the stellar masses of the merging galaxies by comparing the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer 3.4um emission with the calibrated y'-band data. We present a catalog of the r'-, z'-, and y'-band photometric results for 4698 merging galaxies. For extended sources, our results suggest that the homomorphic-aperture method can obtain more reasonable results than the Desktop Virtual Observatory photometry. We derived new relations between the Pan-STARRS y'-band luminosities and the stellar masses of the merging galaxies. Our results show that the stellar masses of the merging galaxies range from 10^8^ to 10^13^M_{sun}_; some of the dry mergers could be as massive as 10^13^M_{sun}_.
- ID:
- ivo://CDS.VizieR/J/AJ/127/1883
- Title:
- Merging galaxies in SDSS EDR
- Short Name:
- J/AJ/127/1883
- Date:
- 21 Oct 2021
- Publisher:
- CDS
- Description:
- We present a new catalog of merging galaxies obtained through an automated systematic search routine. The 1479 new pairs of merging galaxies were found in ~462 square degrees of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Early Data Release (SDSS EDR, Cat. <J/AJ/123/567>) photometric data, and the pair catalog is complete for galaxies in the magnitude range 16.0<=g*<=20. The selection algorithm, implementing a variation on the original Karachentsev criteria, proved to be very efficient and fast. Merging galaxies were selected such that the intergalaxy separations were less than the sum of the component galaxies' radii. We discuss the characteristics of the sample in terms of completeness, pair separation, and the Holmberg effect. We also present an on-line atlas of images for the SDSS EDR pairs obtained using the corrected frames from the SDSS EDR database. The atlas images also include the relevant data for each pair member. This catalog will be useful for conducting studies of the general characteristics of merging galaxies, their environments, and their component galaxies. The redshifts for a subset of the interacting and merging galaxies and the distribution of angular sizes for these systems indicate the SDSS provides a much deeper sample than almost any other wide-area catalog to date.
- ID:
- ivo://CDS.VizieR/J/A+A/582/A21
- Title:
- Merging galaxies (mis)alignments
- Short Name:
- J/A+A/582/A21
- Date:
- 21 Oct 2021
- Publisher:
- CDS
- Description:
- We present spatially resolved stellar and/or ionized gas kinematic properties for a sample of 103 interacting galaxies, tracing all merger stages: close companions, pairs with morphological signatures of interaction, and coalesced merger remnants. In order to distinguish kinematic properties caused by a merger event from those driven by internal processes, we compare our galaxies with a control sample of 80 non-interacting galaxies. We measure for both the stellar and the ionized gas components the major (projected) kinematic position angles (PA_kin_, approaching and receding) directly from the velocity distributions with no assumptions on the internal motions. This method also allow us to derive the deviations of the kinematic PAs from a straight line ({delta}PA_kin_). We find that around half of the interacting objects show morpho-kinematic PA misalignments that cannot be found in the control sample. In particular, we observe those misalignments in galaxies with morphological signatures of interaction. On the other hand, the level of alignment between the approaching and receding sides for both samples is similar, with most of the galaxies displaying small misalignments. Radial deviations of the kinematic PA orientation from a straight line in the stellar component measured by {delta}PA_kin_ are large for both samples. However, for a large fraction of interacting galaxies the ionized gas {delta}PA_kin_ is larger than the typical values derived from isolated galaxies (48%), indicating that this parameter is a good indicator to trace the impact of interaction and mergers in the internal motions of galaxies. By comparing the stellar and ionized gas kinematic PA, we find that 42% (28/66) of the interacting galaxies have misalignments larger than 16{deg}, compared to 10% from the control sample. Our results show the impact of interactions in the motion of stellar and ionized gas as well as the wide the variety of their spatially resolved kinematic distributions. This study also provides a local Universe benchmark for kinematic studies in merging galaxies at high redshift.
- ID:
- ivo://CDS.VizieR/J/ApJ/832/90
- Title:
- Merging galaxies with tidal tails in COSMOS to z=1
- Short Name:
- J/ApJ/832/90
- Date:
- 21 Oct 2021
- Publisher:
- CDS
- Description:
- Tidal tails are created in major mergers involving disk galaxies. It remains to be explored how the tidal tails trace the assembly history of massive galaxies. We identify a sample of 461 merging galaxies with long tidal tails, from 35076 galaxies mass-complete at M*>=10^9.5^M_{sun}_ and 0.2<=z<=1, based on Hubble Space Telescope/ACS F814W imaging data and public catalogs of the COSMOS field. The long tails refer to those with length equal to or greater than the diameter of their host galaxies. The mergers with tidal tails are selected using our novel A_O_-D_O_ technique for strong asymmetric features, along with visual examination. Our results show that the fraction of tidal-tailed mergers evolves mildly with redshift, as ~(1+z)^2.0+/-0.4^, and becomes relatively higher in less-massive galaxies, out to z=1. With a timescale of 0.5Gyr for the tidal-tailed mergers, we obtain that the occurrence rate of such mergers follows 0.01+/-0.007(1+z)^2.3+/-1.4^Gyr^-1^, and corresponds to ~0.3 events since z=1, as well as roughly one-third of the total budget of major mergers from the literature. For disk-involved major mergers, nearly half of them have undergone a phase with long tidal tails.
- ID:
- ivo://CDS.VizieR/J/ApJ/727/14
- Title:
- Merging galaxy cluster A2255 in mid-IR
- Short Name:
- J/ApJ/727/14
- Date:
- 21 Oct 2021
- Publisher:
- CDS
- Description:
- We present the mid-infrared (MIR) observation of a nearby galaxy cluster, A2255, by the AKARI space telescope. Using AKARI's continuous wavelength coverage between 3 and 24um and the wide field of view, we investigate the properties of cluster member galaxies to see how the infall of the galaxies, the cluster substructures, and the cluster-cluster merger influence their evolution. We show that the excess of MIR (~11um) flux is a good indicator for discriminating galaxies at different evolutionary stages and for dividing galaxies into three classes accordingly: strong MIR-excess (N3-S11>0.2) galaxies that include both unobscured and obscured star-forming galaxies; weak MIR-excess (-2.0<N3-S11<-1.2) galaxies that are quiescent, old (>5Gyr) galaxies where the MIR emission arises mainly from the circumstellar dust around AGB stars; and intermediate MIR-excess (-1.2<N3-S11<0.2) galaxies in between the two classes that are less than a few Gyr old past the prime star formation activity. With the MIR-excess diagnostics, we investigate how local and cluster-scale environments affect the individual galaxies. We derive the total star formation rate (SFR) and the specific SFR of A2255 using the strong MIR-excess galaxies.
- ID:
- ivo://CDS.VizieR/J/ApJS/240/39
- Title:
- Merging galaxy cluster deep observations
- Short Name:
- J/ApJS/240/39
- Date:
- 18 Jan 2022 14:59:05
- Publisher:
- CDS
- Description:
- Multi-band photometric and multi-object spectroscopic surveys of merging galaxy clusters allow for the characterization of the distributions of constituent DM and galaxy populations, constraints on the dynamics of the merging subclusters, and an understanding of galaxy evolution of member galaxies. We present deep photometric observations from Subaru/SuprimeCam and a catalog of 4431 spectroscopic galaxies from Keck/DEIMOS observations of 29 merging galaxy clusters ranging in redshift from z=0.07 to 0.55. The ensemble is compiled based on the presence of radio relics, which highlight cluster-scale collisionless shocks in the intracluster medium. Together with the spectroscopic and photometric information, the velocities, timescales, and geometries of the respective merging events may be tightly constrained. In this preliminary analysis, the velocity distributions of 28 of the 29 clusters are shown to be well fit by single Gaussians. This indicates that radio-relic mergers largely occur transverse to the line of sight and/or near-apocenter. In this paper, we present our optical and spectroscopic surveys, preliminary results, and a discussion of the value of radio-relic mergers for developing accurate dynamical models of each system.
