English

A discrete chemo-dynamical model of M87's globular clusters: Kinematics extending to ~ 400 kpc

Astrophysics of Galaxies 2020-05-20 v1

Abstract

We study the mass distribution and kinematics of the giant elliptical galaxy M87 (NGC 4486) using discrete chemo-dynamical, axisymmetric Jeans equation modelling. Our catalogue comprises 894 globular clusters (GCs) extending to a projected radius of 430\sim 430 kpc with line-of-sight velocities and colours, and Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE) integral field unit data within the central 2.42.4 kpc of the main galaxy. The gravitational potential for our models is a combination of a luminous matter potential with a varying mass-to-light ratio for the main galaxy, a supermassive black hole and a dark matter (DM) potential with a cusped or cored DM halo. The best-fitting models with either a cusped or a cored DM halo show no significant differences and both are acceptable. We obtain a total mass of (2.16±0.38)×1013M(2.16 \pm 0.38) \times 10^{13} M_{\odot} within \sim 400 kpc. By including the stellar mass-to-light ratio gradient, the DM fraction increases from \sim 26 percent (with no gradient) to \sim 73 percent within 1Remaj1\,R_e^{\rm maj} (major axis of half-light isophote, 14.2 kpc), and from \sim 84 percent to \sim 94 percent within 5Remaj5\,R_e^{\rm maj} (71.2 kpc). Red GCs have moderate rotation with Vmax/σV_{\rm max}/\sigma \sim 0.4, and blue GCs have weak rotation with Vmax/σV_{\rm max}/\sigma \sim 0.1. Red GCs have tangential velocity dispersion anisotropy, while blue GCs are consistent with being nearly isotropic. Our results suggest that red GCs are more likely to be born in-situ, while blue GCs are more likely to be accreted.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2005.09410,
  title  = {A discrete chemo-dynamical model of M87's globular clusters: Kinematics extending to ~ 400 kpc},
  author = {Chao Li and Ling Zhu and R. J. Long and Shude Mao and Eric W. Peng and Marc Sarzi and Glenn van de Ven and Hongxin Zhang and Rui Guo and Xiangxiang Xue and Alessia Longobardi and Patrick Côté and Laura Ferrarese and Chengze Liu and Stephen Gwyn and Sungsoon Lim and Youkyung Ko},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2005.09410},
  year   = {2020}
}