We have examined the resolved stellar populations at large galactocentric distances along the minor axis (from 10 kpc up to between 40 and 75 kpc), with limited major axis coverage, of six nearby highly-inclined Milky Way-mass disc galaxies using HST data from the GHOSTS survey. We select red giant branch stars to derive stellar halo density profiles. The projected minor axis density profiles can be approximated by power laws with projected slopes of between −2 and −3.7 and a diversity of stellar halo masses of 1 − 6 × 10 9 M , or 2 − 14% of the total galaxy stellar masses. The typical intrinsic scatter around a smooth power law fit is 0.05 − 0.1 dex owing to substructure. By comparing the minor and major axis profiles, we infer projected axis ratios c/a at ∼ 25 kpc between 0.4 − 0.75. The GHOSTS stellar haloes are diverse, lying between the extremes charted out by the (rather atypical) haloes of the Milky Way and M31. We find a strong correlation between the stellar halo metallicities and the stellar halo masses. We compare our results with cosmological models, finding good agreement between our observations and accretion-only models where the stellar haloes are formed by the disruption of dwarf satellites. In particular, the strong observed correlation between stellar halo metallicity and mass is naturally reproduced. Low-resolution hydrodynamical models have unrealistically high stellar halo masses. Current high-resolution hydrodynamical models appear to predict stellar halo masses somewhat higher than observed but with reasonable metallicities, metallicity gradients and density profiles.

We present an overview of the GHOSTS survey, the largest study to date of the resolved stellar populations in the outskirts of disk galaxies. The sample consists of 14 disk galaxies within 17 Mpc, whose outer disks and halos are imaged with the Hubble Space Telescope Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS). In the first paper of this series, we describe the sample, explore the benefits of using resolved stellar populations, and discuss our ACS F606W and F814W photometry. We use artificial star tests to assess completeness and use overlapping regions to estimate photometric uncertainties. The median depth of the survey at 50% completeness is 2.7 mag below the tip of the red giant branch (TRGB). We comprehensively explore and parameterize contamination from unresolved background galaxies and foreground stars using archival fields of high-redshift ACS observations. Left uncorrected, these would account for 10 0.65×F814W−19.0 detections per mag per arcsec 2. We therefore identify several selection criteria that typically remove 95% of the contaminants. Even with these culls, background galaxies are a significant limitation to the surface brightness detection limit which, for this survey, is typically V ∼ 30 mag arcsec −2. The resulting photometric catalogs are publicly available and contain some 3.1 million stars across 76 ACS fields, predominantly of low extinction. The uniform magnitudes of TRGB stars in these fields enable galaxy distance estimates with 2%-7% accuracy.

We study the stellar halo colour properties of six nearby massive highly inclined disk galaxies using HST ACS and WFC3 observations in both F 606W and F 814W filters from the GHOSTS survey. The observed fields probe the stellar outskirts out to projected distances of ∼ 50 -70 kpc from their galactic centre along the minor axis. The 50% completeness levels of the colour magnitude diagrams are typically at two mag below the tip of the red giant branch. We find that all galaxies have extended stellar haloes out to ∼ 50 kpc and two out to ∼ 70 kpc. We determined the halo colour distribution and colour profile for each galaxy using the median colours of stars in the RGB. Within each galaxy we find variations in the median colours as a function of radius which likely indicates population variations, reflecting that their outskirts were built from several small accreted objects. We find that half of the galaxies (NGC 0891, NGC 4565, and NGC 7814) present a clear negative colour gradient in their haloes, reflecting a declining metallicity; the other have no significant colour or population gradient. In addition, notwithstanding the modest sample size of galaxies, there is no strong correlation between their halo colour/metallicity or gradient with galaxy's properties such as rotational velocity or stellar mass. The diversity in halo colour profiles observed in the GHOSTS galaxies qualitatively supports the predicted galaxy-to-galaxy scatter in halo stellar properties; a consequence of the stochasticity inherent in the assembling history of galaxies.

We analyzed the radial surface brightness profile of the spiral galaxy NGC 7793 using HST/ACS images from the GHOSTS survey and a new HST/WFC3 image across the disk break. We used the photometry of resolved stars to select distinct populations covering a wide range of stellar ages. We found breaks in the radial profiles of all stellar populations at 280 (∼5.1 kpc). Beyond this disk break, the profiles become steeper for younger populations. This same trend is seen in numerical simulations where the outer disk is formed almost entirely by radial migration. We also found that the older stars of NGC 7793 extend significantly farther than the underlying H i disk. They are thus unlikely to have formed entirely at their current radii, unless the gas disk was substantially larger in the past. These observations thus provide evidence for substantial stellar radial migration in late-type disks.

We use the Hubble Space Telescope ACS to study the resolved stellar populations of the nearby, nearly edgeon galaxy NGC 4244 across its outer disk surface density break. The stellar photometry allows us to study the distribution of different stellar populations and reach very low equivalent surface brightnesses. We find that the break occurs at the same radius for young, intermediate-age, and old stars. The stellar density beyond the break drops sharply by a factor of at least 600 in 5 kpc. The break occurs at the same radius independent of height above the disk, but is sharpest in the midplane and nearly disappears at large heights. These results make it unlikely that truncations are caused by a star formation threshold alone: the threshold would have to keep the same radial position from less than 100 Myr to 10 Gyr ago, in spite of potential disturbances such as infall and redistribution of gas by internal processes. A dynamical interpretation of truncation formation is more likely, such as due to angular momentum redistribution by bars or density waves, or heating and stripping of stars caused by the bombardment of dark matter subhalos. The latter explanation is also in quantitative agreement with the small diffuse component we see around the galaxy.