The “Building Blocks” of Stellar Halos
Date
2017
Authors
Oman, Kyle A.
Starkenburg, Else
Navarro, Julio F.
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Galaxies
Abstract
The stellar halos of galaxies encode their accretion histories. In particular, the median
metallicity of a halo is determined primarily by the mass of the most massive accreted object. We use hydrodynamical cosmological simulations from the APOSTLE project to study the connection between the stellar mass, the metallicity distribution, and the stellar age distribution of a halo and the identity of its most massive progenitor. We find that the stellar populations in an accreted halo typically resemble the old stellar populations in a present-day dwarf galaxy with a stellar mass ~0.2–0.5 dex greater than that of the stellar halo. This suggests that had they not been accreted, the primary progenitors of stellar halos would have evolved to resemble typical nearby dwarf irregulars.
Description
Keywords
galaxy formation and evolution, stellar halo, numerical simulations
Citation
Oman, K.A., Starkenburg, E. & Navarro, J.F. (2017). The “Building Blocks” of Stellar Halos. Galaxies, 5(3), 33. https://doi.org/10.3390/galaxies5030033