共查询到20条相似文献，搜索用时 265 毫秒
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Amina Helmi 《Astronomy and Astrophysics Review》2008,15(3):145-188
Stellar halos may hold some of the best preserved fossils of the formation history of galaxies. They are a natural product
of the merging processes that probably take place during the assembly of a galaxy, and hence may well be the most ubiquitous
component of galaxies, independently of their Hubble type. This review focuses on our current understanding of the spatial
structure, the kinematics and chemistry of halo stars in the Milky Way. In recent years, we have experienced a change in paradigm
thanks to the discovery of large amounts of substructure, especially in the outer halo. I discuss the implications of the
currently available observational constraints and fold them into several possible formation scenarios. Unraveling the formation
of the Galactic halo will be possible in the near future through a combination of large wide field photometric and spectroscopic
surveys, and especially in the era of Gaia. 相似文献
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The halo structure at high Galactic latitudes near both the north and south poles is studied using Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) and SuperCOSMOS data. For the south cap halo, the archive of the SuperCOSMOS photographic photometry sky survey is used. The coincident source rate between SuperCOSMOS data in B J band from 16.5 to 20.5 mag and SDSS data is about 92 per cent, in a common sky area in the south. While that in the R F band is about 85 per cent from 16.5 to 19.5 mag. Transformed to the SuperCOSMOS system and downgraded to the limiting magnitudes of SuperCOSMOS, the star counts in the North Galactic Cap from SDSS show up to an 16.9 ± 6.3 per cent asymmetric ratio (defined as relative fluctuations over the rotational symmetry structure) in the B J band, and up to 13.5 ± 6.7 per cent asymmetric ratio in the R F band. From SuperCOSMOS B J and R F bands, the structure of the Southern Galactic hemisphere does not show the same obvious asymmetric structures as the northern sky does in both the original and downgraded SDSS star counts. An axisymmetric halo model with n = 2.8 and q = 0.7 can fit the projected number density from SuperCOSMOS fairly well, with an average error of about 9.17 per cent. By careful analysis of the difference of star counts between the downgraded SDSS northern halo data and SuperCOSMOS southern halo data, it is shown that no asymmetry can be detected in the South Galactic Cap at the accuracy of SuperCOSMOS, and the Virgo overdensity is likely a foreign component in the Galactic halo. 相似文献
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Using the stellar photometry catalogue based on the latest data release (DR4) of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), a study of the Galactic structure using star counts is carried out for selected areas of the sky. The sample areas are selected along a circle at a Galactic latitude of +60°, and 10 strips of high Galactic latitude along different longitudes. Direct statistics of the data show that the surface densities of ℓ from 180° to 360° are systematically higher than those of ℓ from 0° to 180°, defining a region of overdensity (in the direction of Virgo) and another one of underdensity (in the direction of Ursa Major) with respect to an axisymmetric model. It is shown by comparing the results from star counts in the ( g − r ) colour that the density deviations are due to an asymmetry of the stellar density in the halo. Theoretical models for the surface density profile are built and star counts are performed using a triaxial halo of which the parameters are constrained by observational data. Two possible reasons for the asymmetric structure are discussed. 相似文献
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Mapping the substructure in the Galactic halo with the next generation of astrometric satellites 总被引：1，自引：0，他引：1
Amina Helmi † P. Tim de Zeeuw 《Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society》2000,319(3):657-665
We run numerical simulations of the disruption of satellite galaxies in a Galactic potential to build up the entire stellar halo, in order to investigate what the next generation of astrometric satellites will reveal by observing the halo of the Milky Way. We generate artificial DIVA , FAME and GAIA halo catalogues, in which we look for the signatures left by the accreted satellites. We develop a method based on the standard Friends-of-Friends algorithm applied to the space of integrals of motion. We find this simple method can recover about 50 per cent of the different accretion events, when the observational uncertainties expected for GAIA are taken into account, even when the exact form of the Galactic potential is unknown. The recovery rate for DIVA and FAME is much smaller, but these missions, like GAIA , should be able to test the hierarchical formation paradigm on our Galaxy by measuring the amount of halo substructure in the form of nearby kinematically cold streams with, for example, a two-point correlation function in velocity space. 相似文献
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Chigurupati Murali † Phil Arras Ira Wasserman 《Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society》2000,313(1):87-98
We establish constraints on the mass and abundance of black holes in the Galactic halo by determining their impact on globular clusters, which are conventionally considered to be little evolved. Using detailed Monte Carlo simulations and simple evolutionary models, we argue that black holes with masses M bh ≳(1–3)×106 M⊙ can comprise no more than a fraction f bh ≈0.17 of the total halo density at Galactocentric radius R ≈8 kpc. This bound arises from requiring stability of the cluster mass function. A more restrictive bound may be derived if we demand that the probability of destruction of any given, low-mass M c ≈(2.5–7.5)×104 M⊙ ] globular cluster not exceed 50 per cent; this bound is f bh ≲0.025–0.05 at R ≈8 kpc. This constraint improves those based on disc heating and dynamical friction arguments as well as current lensing results. At smaller radius the constraint on f bh strengthens, while at larger radius an increased fraction of black holes is allowed. 相似文献
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Xavier Hernandez † Andrea Ferrara 《Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society》2001,324(2):484-490
We explore the predictions of the standard hierarchical clustering scenario of galaxy formation, regarding the numbers and metallicities of PopIII stars that are likely to be found within our Galaxy today. By PopIII we refer to stars formed at large redshift ( z >4), with low metallicities ([ Z /Z⊙ ]<−2.5) and in small systems (total mass ≲ 2×108 M⊙ ) that are extremely sensitive to stellar feedback, and which through a prescribed merging history end up becoming part of the Milky Way today. An analytic, extended Press–Schechter formalism is used to obtain the mass functions of haloes which will host PopIII stars at a given redshift, and which will end up in Milky Way sized systems today. Each of these is modelled as a mini-galaxy, with a detailed treatment of the dark halo structure, angular momentum distribution, final gas temperature and disc instabilities, all of which determine the fraction of the baryons that are subject to star formation. The use of new primordial metallicity stellar evolutionary models allows us to trace the history of the stars formed, and give accurate estimates of their expected numbers today and their location in L /L⊙ versus T /K Hertzsprung–Russell (HR) diagrams. A first comparison with observational data suggests that the initial mass function (IMF) of the first stars was increasingly high-mass weighted towards high redshifts, levelling off at z ≳9 at a characteristic stellar mass scale m s =10–15 M⊙ . 相似文献
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M. C. Smith N. W. Evans V. Belokurov P. C. Hewett D. M. Bramich G. Gilmore M. J. Irwin S. Vidrih D. B. Zucker 《Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society》2009,399(3):1223-1237
We construct a new sample of ∼1700 solar neighbourhood halo subdwarfs from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), selected using a reduced proper-motion diagram. Radial velocities come from the SDSS spectra and proper motions from the light-motion curve catalogue of Bramich et al. Using a photometric parallax relation to estimate distances gives us the full phase-space coordinates. Typical velocity errors are in the range 30–50 km s−1 . This halo sample is one of the largest constructed to date and the disc contamination is at a level of ≲1 per cent. This enables us to calculate the halo velocity dispersion to excellent accuracy. We find that the velocity dispersion tensor is aligned in spherical polar coordinates and that (σ r , σφ , σθ ) = (143 ± 2, 82 ± 2, 77 ± 2) km s−1 . The stellar halo exhibits no net rotation, although the distribution of v φ shows tentative evidence for asymmetry. The kinematics are consistent with a mildly flattened stellar density falling with distance like r −3.75 .
Using the full phase-space coordinates, we look for signs of kinematic substructure in the stellar halo. We find evidence for four discrete overdensities localized in angular momentum and suggest that they may be possible accretion remnants. The most prominent is the solar neighbourhood stream previously identified by Helmi et al., but the remaining three are new. One of these overdensities is potentially associated with a group of four globular clusters (NGC 5466, NGC 6934, M2 and M13) and raises the possibility that these could have been accreted as part of a much larger progenitor. 相似文献
Using the full phase-space coordinates, we look for signs of kinematic substructure in the stellar halo. We find evidence for four discrete overdensities localized in angular momentum and suggest that they may be possible accretion remnants. The most prominent is the solar neighbourhood stream previously identified by Helmi et al., but the remaining three are new. One of these overdensities is potentially associated with a group of four globular clusters (NGC 5466, NGC 6934, M2 and M13) and raises the possibility that these could have been accreted as part of a much larger progenitor. 相似文献
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Hypervelocity stars (HVSs) ejected by the massive black hole at the Galactic Centre have unique kinematic properties compared to other halo stars. Their trajectories will deviate from being exactly radial because of the asymmetry of the Milky Way potential produced by the flattened disc and the triaxial dark matter halo, causing a change of angular momentum that can be much larger than the initial small value at injection. We study the kinematics of HVSs and propose an estimator of dark halo triaxiality that is determined only by instantaneous position and velocity vectors of HVSs at large Galactocentric distances ( r ≳ 50 kpc). We show that, in the case of a substantially triaxial halo, the distribution of deflection angles (the angle between the stellar position and velocity vector) for HVSs on bound orbits is spread uniformly over the range 10°–180°. Future astrometric and deep wide-field surveys should measure the positions and velocities of a significant number of HVSs, and provide useful constraints on the shape of the Galactic dark matter halo. 相似文献