We identify new structures in the halo of the Milky Way Galaxy from positions, colors and magnitudes of five million stars detected in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. Most of these stars are within 1.26 degrees of the celestial equator. We present color-magnitude diagrams (CMDs) for stars in two previously discovered, tidally disrupted structures. The CMDs and turnoff colors are consistent with those of the Sagittarius dwarf galaxy, as had been predicted. In one direction, we are even able to detect a clump of red stars, similar to that of the Sagittarius dwarf, from stars spread across 110 square degrees of sky. Focusing on stars with the colors of F turnoff objects, we identify at least five additional overdensities of stars. Four of these may be pieces of the same halo structure, which would cover a region of the sky at least 40 degrees in diameter, at a distance of 11 kpc from the Sun (18 kpc from the center of the Galaxy). The turnoff is significantly bluer than that of thick disk stars, and closer to the Galactic plane than a power-law spheroid. We suggest two models to explain this new structure. One possibility is that this new structure could be a new dwarf satellite of the Milky Way, hidden in the Galactic plane, and in the process of being tidally disrupted. The other possibility is that it could be part of a disk-like distribution of stars which is metal-poor, with a scale height of approximately 2 kpc and a scale length of approximately 10 kpc. The fifth overdensity, which is 20 kpc away, is some distance from the Sagittarius dwarf streamer orbit and is not associated with any known structure in the Galactic plane. It is likely that there are many smaller streams of stars in the Galactic halo.Comment: ApJ, in press; 26 figures including several in colo
We report the discovery of two well-defined tidal tails emerging from the sparse remote globular cluster Palomar 5. These tails stretch out symmetrically to both sides of the cluster in the direction of constant Galactic latitude and subtend an angle of 2.6 • on the sky. The tails have been detected in commissioning data of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), providing deep five-color photometry in a 2.5 • wide band along the equator. The stars in the tails make up a substantial part (∼ 1/3) of the current total population of cluster stars in the magnitude interval 19.5 ≤ i * ≤ 22.0. This reveals that the cluster is subject to heavy mass loss. The orientation of the tails provides an important key for the determination of the cluster's Galactic orbit.
Two studies have recently reported the discovery of pronounced Halo substructure in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) commissioning data. Here we show that this Halo substructure is almost in its entirety due to the expected tidal stream torn off the Sagittarius dwarf galaxy during the course of its many close encounters with the Milky Way. This interpretation makes strong predictions on the kinematics and distances of these stream stars. Comparison of the structure in old horizontal branch stars, detected by the SDSS team, with the carbon star structure discovered in our own survey, indicates that this halo stream is of comparable age to the Milky Way. It would appear that the Milky Way and the Sagittarius dwarf galaxy have been a strongly interacting system for most of their existence. Once complete, the SDSS will provide a unique dataset with which to constrain the dynamical evolution of the Sagittarius dwarf galaxy, it will also strongly constrain the mass distribution of the outer Milky Way.
The enormous radiative and mechanical luminosities of massive stars impact a vast range of scales and processes, from the reionization of the universe, to the evolution of galaxies, to the regulation of the interstellar medium, to the formation of star clusters, and even to the formation of planets around stars in such clusters. Two main classes of massive star formation theory are under active study, Core Accretion and Competitive Accretion. In Core Accretion, the initial conditions are self-gravitating, centrally concentrated cores that condense with a range of masses from the surrounding, fragmenting clump environment. They then undergo relatively ordered collapse via a central disk to form a single star or a small-N multiple. In this case, the pre-stellar core mass function has a similar form to the stellar initial mass function. In Competitive Accretion, the material that forms a massive star is drawn more chaotically from a wider region of the clump without passing through a phase of being in a massive, coherent core. In this case, massive star formation must proceed hand in hand with star cluster formation. If stellar densities become very high near the cluster center, then collisions between stars may also help to form the most massive stars. We review recent theoretical and observational progress towards understanding massive star formation, considering physical and chemical processes, comparisons with low and intermediate-mass stars, and connections to star cluster formation.Comment: Accepted for publication as a chapter in Protostars and Planets VI, University of Arizona Press (2014), eds. H. Beuther, R. Klessen, C. Dullemond, Th. Hennin
Abstract.We have analysed high resolution adaptive optics (AO) science demonstration data of the young, massive stellar cluster Arches near the Galactic Center, obtained with the Gemini North telescope in combination with the University of Hawai'i AO system Hokupa'a. The AO H and K photometry is calibrated using HST/NICMOS observations in the equivalent filters F160W and F205W obtained by Figer et al. (1999). The calibration procedure allows a detailed comparison of the ground-based adaptive optics observations against diffraction limited space-based photometry. The spatial resolution as well as the overall signal-to-noise ratio of the Gemini/Hokupa'a data is comparable to the HST/NICMOS data. The low Strehl ratio of only a few percent is the dominant limiting factor in the Gemini AO science demonstration data as opposed to space-based observations. After a thorough technical comparison, the Gemini and HST data are used in combination to study the spatial distribution of stellar masses in the Arches cluster. Arches is one of the densest young clusters known in the Milky Way, with a central density of ∼3 × 10 5 M pc −3 and a total mass of about 10 4 M . A strong colour gradient is observed over the cluster field. The visual extinction increases by ∆A V ∼ 10 mag over a distance of 15 from the cluster core. Extinction maps reveal a low-extinction cavity in the densest parts of Arches (R ≤ 5 ), indicating the depletion of dust due to stellar winds or photo-evaporation. We correct for the change in extinction over the field and show that the slope of the mass function is strongly influenced by the effects of differential extinction. We obtain present-day mass function slopes of Γ ∼ −0.8 ± 0.2 in the mass range 6 < M < 65 M from both data sets. The spatial analysis reveals a steepening of the mass function slope from close to zero in the cluster center to Γ ∼ −1.7 ± 0.7 at R > 10 , in accordance with a Salpeter slope (Γ = −1.35). The bias in the mass function towards high-mass stars in the Arches center is a strong indication for mass segregation. The dynamical and relaxation timescales for Arches are estimated, and possible mass segregation effects are discussed with respect to cluster formation models.
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