Facial reconstruction

Search LJMU Research Online

Browse Repository | Browse E-Theses

The population of Milky Way satellites in the Lambda cold dark matter cosmology

Font, AS, Benson, AJ, Bower, RG, Frenk, CS, Cooper, A, DeLucia, G, Helly, JC, Helmi, A, Li, Y-S, McCarthy, IG, Navarro, JF, Springel, V, Starkenburg, E, Wang, J and White, SDM (2011) The population of Milky Way satellites in the Lambda cold dark matter cosmology. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 417 (2). pp. 1260-1279. ISSN 0035-8711

[img]
Preview
Text
The population of Milky Way satellites in the Lambda cold dark matter cosmology.pdf - Published Version

Download (923kB) | Preview

Abstract

We present a model for the satellites of the Milky Way in which galaxy formation is followed using semi-analytic techniques applied to the six high-resolution N-body simulations of galactic haloes of the Aquarius project. The model, calculated using the GALFORM code, incorporates improved treatments of the relevant physics in the Λ cold dark matter cosmogony, particularly a self-consistent calculation of reionization by ultraviolet (UV) photons emitted by the forming galaxy population, including the progenitors of the central galaxy. Along the merger tree of each halo, the model calculates gas cooling (by Compton scattering off cosmic microwave background photons, molecular hydrogen and atomic processes), gas heating (from hydrogen photoionization and supernova energy), star formation and evolution. The evolution of the intergalactic medium is followed simultaneously with that of the galaxies. Star formation in the more massive progenitor subhaloes is suppressed primarily by supernova feedback, while for smaller subhaloes, it is suppressed primarily by photoionization due to external and internal sources. The model is constrained to match a wide range of properties of the present-day galaxy population as a whole, but at high redshift it requires an escape fraction of UV photons near unity in order to completely reionize the universe by redshift z≳ 8. In the most successful model, the local sources photoionize the pre-galactic region completely by z≃ 10. In addition to the luminosity function of Milky Way satellites, the model matches their observed luminosity–metallicity relation, their radial distribution and the inferred values of the mass within 300 pc, which in the models increase slowly but significantly with luminosity. There is a large variation in satellite properties from halo to halo, with the luminosity function, for example, varying by a factor of ∼2 among the six simulations.

Item Type: Article
Additional Information: This article has been accepted for publication in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society ©: 2011 The Authors Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Royal Astronomical Society. All rights reserved.
Uncontrolled Keywords: 0201 Astronomical and Space Sciences
Subjects: Q Science > QB Astronomy
Q Science > QC Physics
Divisions: Astrophysics Research Institute
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Related URLs:
Date Deposited: 14 Apr 2020 09:25
Last Modified: 04 Sep 2021 07:29
DOI or ID number: 10.1111/j.1365-2966.2011.19339.x
URI: https://researchonline.ljmu.ac.uk/id/eprint/12712
View Item View Item