Multiple Tracers of Structure, Substructure, and Dynamics of Galaxy Halos
Abstract
I will present a suite of results on the fundamental properties of galaxy halos, using a variety of observational tracers for a range of galaxy types, from giant ellipticals to spirals to dwarfs, along with comparisons to numerical simulations. The tracers include diffuse stellar light spectroscopy up to ~4 Re, resolved stellar photometry and spectroscopy, metal-poor and metal-rich globular cluster subpopulations, and planetary nebulae. The results include extended rotation and metallicity profiles, scaling relations for total angular momentum, shape inferences for the halos, orbital anisotropy estimates, kinematically "decoupled" halos, surprisingly homogeneous total mass profiles, and both detection and chemodynamical mapping of streams, shells, and other substructures. Connections are made to simulations of idealized galaxy mergers and of full cosmological formation histories, using the observed properties to make inferences about the assembly mechanisms of individual galaxies and of different galaxy types. Detailed models of stellar streams are used to infer their progenitor properties and to probe the gravitational potentials of the host galaxies. Novel observations are presented of compact stellar systems (globular clusters, ultra-compact dwarfs, compact ellipticals, and transition objects), with implications for the merger histories of their host halos.
- Publication:
-
IAU General Assembly
- Pub Date:
- August 2015
- Bibcode:
- 2015IAUGA..2256404R