Related papers: Dwarf galaxies beyond our doorstep: the Centaurus …
Recent results on the detection of substructure in dwarf spheroidal galaxies are discussed. In most cases they show that, when a galaxy experiences multiple SF episodes, the intermediate age population is more centrally concentrated than…
In this contribution the discovery and properties of ultra-compact dwarf galaxies are presented, and their possible origin is discussed. This new type of galaxy resides in the cores of galaxy clusters. In the fundamental plane diagram of…
The formation of globular clusters remains an open debate. Dwarf starburst galaxies are efficient at forming young massive clusters with similar masses as globular clusters and may hold the key to understanding their formation. We study…
We report the results of a survey of the region within 40 arcmin of NGC 891, a nearby nearly perfectly edge-on spiral galaxy. Candidate "non-stars" with diameters greater than 15 arcsec were selected from the GSC 2.3.2 catalog and…
I present a brief review of the stellar population properties of massive galaxies, focusing on early-type galaxies in particular, with emphasis on recent results from the ATLAS3D Survey. I discuss the occurrence of young stellar ages, cold…
We use a new set of cold dark matter simulations of the local universe to investigate the distribution of fossils of primordial dwarf galaxies within, and around the Milky Way. Throughout, we build upon previous results showing agreement…
What can we learn from the somewhat arduous study of old stellar populations in nearby galaxies? Unless the nearby universe is subtly anomalous, it should contain a relatively normal selection of galaxies whose histories are representative…
Aim: To extend the investigations of ultra-compact dwarf galaxies (UCDs) beyond the well studied Fornax and Virgo clusters. Methods: We measured spectroscopic redshifts of about 400 compact object candidates with 19.2 < V < 22.4 mag in the…
We use a new fiber spectroscopic survey of 12 nearby, poor groups of galaxies to examine the dynamics and evolution of galaxies in these common, but poorly studied, environments. Some of our conclusions are: (1) The nine groups in our…
Dwarf galaxies are ubiquitous throughout the universe and are extremely sensitive to various forms of internal and external feedback. Over the last two decades, the census of dwarf galaxies in the Local Group and beyond has increased…
A subgroup of dwarf galaxies have characteristics of a possible evolutionary transition between star-forming systems and dwarf ellipticals. These systems host significant starbursts in combination with smooth, elliptical outer envelopes and…
Context: The Hubble tuning fork diagram has always been the preferred scheme for classification of galaxies. It is based on morphology only. At the opposite, biologists have long taken into account the genealogical relatedness of living…
Virgo is a dynamically young galaxy cluster with substructure in its spatial and kinematic distribution. Here, we simultaneously study the phase-space distribution and the main characteristics of Virgo's galaxies, particularly its most…
A recent all-object spectroscopic survey centred on the Fornax cluster of galaxies, has discovered a population of sub-luminous and extremely compact members, called ``ultra-compact dwarf'' (UCD) galaxies. In order to clarify the origin of…
Dwarf galaxies are by far the most abundant of all galaxy types, yet their properties are still poorly understood -especially due to the observational challenge that their intrinsic faintness represents. AVOCADO aims at establishing firm…
We study a sample of nearby (z~0.2) low-luminosity dwarf (10^7 MSun < M* < 10^8 MSun) galaxies which have extreme (0.1 - 3 MSun/yr) star formation rates (SFRs) for this mass regime, making them plausible analogues of dwarfs at z~5.5. We…
The dwarf galaxies comparable to the LMC and SMC, with stellar masses $7.5 <{\rm log}(M_{\ast}/M_{\odot})<9.5$, are found in a diversity of environments and have long quenching timescales. We need to understand how this phenomenon is…
We report the results of a systematic photometric survey of the peripheral regions of a sample of fourteen globular clusters in the outer halo of the Milky Way at distances d_GC>25 kpc from the Galactic centre. The survey is aimed at…
We present observations of 82 Local Group dwarf galaxy candidates, of which 62 were chosen visually from ESO-SRC survey plates of the southern sky (32 of which were not previously catalogued) and the rest suggested by various sources in the…
Dwarf galaxies in the Local Group provide a unique astrophysical laboratory. Despite their proximity some of these systems still lack a reliable distance determination as well as studies of their stellar content and star formation history.…