Hubble Astrometry for the Local Group and Beyond in the 2030s
Abstract
Hubble's long, stable astrometric baseline creates a rare opportunity for discovery in the Local Group and beyond. Many nearby galaxies, streams, and star clusters already have archival first-epoch imaging in hand, so future HST observations over the next decade can turn those data into precise proper motions. For many Milky Way satellites, existing measurements already constrain orbital motion at a useful level, but HST still offers a path to full 3D kinematics, internal motions, and more distant systems where current data remain insufficient. That opens the window to dynamical studies inaccessible through line-of-sight velocities alone, revealing orbital histories, internal kinematics, environmental processing, and the dark-matter structure of nearby galaxies. This white paper identifies HST astrometry as an opportunity to capitalize on archival baselines by completing long-baseline measurements where first epochs already exist, establishing new first epochs where critical gaps remain, and assembling a legacy sample for future JWST, Roman, and HWO-era follow-up. The result will be a transformative dataset for the Local Group and Local Volume, driving discovery now while laying the groundwork for the next generation of dynamical studies for resolved stellar populations.
Cite
@article{arxiv.2605.24191,
title = {Hubble Astrometry for the Local Group and Beyond in the 2030s},
author = {S. Tony Sohn and Paul Bennet and Kevin Andrew McKinnon and Roeland P. van der Marel and Mattia Libralato and Eduardo Vitral and Ekta Patel and Laura L. Watkins and Andres del Pino and Andrea Bellini and Massimo Griggio and Mark A. Fardal and Nitya Kallivayalil and Jack T. Warfield and Karoline M. Gilbert and Puragra Guhathakurta and Daniel Weisz and Andrew Wetzel and Andrew B. Pace and Marcel S. Pawlowski and Joshua D. Simon and Gurtina Besla and Erik Tollerud and Xiaowei Ou and Niusha Ahvazi and Anna Bonaca},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2605.24191},
year = {2026}
}
Comments
White Paper submitted to STScI and NASA GSFC in response to "Building a Roadmap for Hubble Science into the 2030s"