English

Candidate Milky Way Satellites in the Galactic Halo

Astrophysics 2011-11-09 v2

Abstract

Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) DR5 photometric data with 120<α<270120^{\circ} < \alpha < 270^{\circ}, 25<δ<7025^{\circ} < \delta < 70^{\circ} are searched for new Milky Way companions or substructures in the Galactic halo. Five candidates are identified as overdensities of faint stellar sources that have color-magnitude diagrams similar to those of known globular clusters or dwarf spheroidal galaxies. The distance to each candidate is estimated by fitting suitable stellar isochrones to the color-magnitude diagrams. Geometric properties and absolute magnitudes are roughly measured and used to determine whether the candidates are likely dwarf spheroidal galaxies, stellar clusters or tidal debris. SDSSJ1000+5730 and SDSSJ1329+2841 are likely faint dwarf galaxy candidates while SDSSJ0814+5105, SDSSJ0821+5608 and SDSSJ1058+2843 are likely extremely faint globular clusters. Follow-up study is needed to confirm these candidates.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.astro-ph/0612173,
  title  = {Candidate Milky Way Satellites in the Galactic Halo},
  author = {C. Liu and J. Hu and H. Newberg and Y. Zhao},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/0612173},
  year   = {2011}
}

Comments

9 pages, 8 figures