Related papers: Galaxies grow their bulges and black holes in dive…
The deep connection between galaxies and their supermassive black holes is central to modern astrophysics and cosmology. The observed correlation between galaxy and black hole mass is usually attributed to the contribution of major mergers…
Stellar haloes form through the disruption of satellite galaxies over time, making them a promising observable for constraining galaxy merger histories. We use a dynamical decomposition technique to isolate the stellar haloes of Milky…
Observational data show that the correlation between supermassive black holes (MBH) and galaxy bulge (Mbulge) masses follows a nearly linear trend, and that the correlation is strongest with the bulge rather than the total stellar mass…
Supermassive black hole (BH) masses (MBH) are strongly correlated with galaxy stellar bulge masses (Mbulge) and there are several ideas to explain the origin of this relationship. This study isolates the role of galaxy mergers from…
We introduce and apply a new approach to probe the response of galactic stellar haloes to the interplay between cosmological merger histories and galaxy formation physics. We perform dark matter-only, zoomed simulations of two Milky…
We use galaxy and dark halo data from the public database for the Millennium Simulation to study the growth of galaxies in the De Lucia et al. (2006) model for galaxy formation. Previous work has shown this model to reproduce many aspects…
The central regions of galaxies show the presence of massive black holes and/or dense stellar systems. The question about their modes of formation is still under debate. A likely explanation of the formation of the central dense stellar…
Galaxies accrete their mass by means of both smooth accretion from the cosmic web, and the mergers of smaller entities. We wish to quantify the respective role of these two modes of accretion, which could determine the morphological types…
The growth of supermassive black holes appears to be driven by galaxy mergers, violent merger-free processes and/or `secular' processes. In order to quantify the effects of secular evolution on black hole growth, we study a sample of active…
Bulges and disks are major structural components that define galaxy morphology. The mass ratios of bulges and disks increase statistically with the galaxy mass, with the high-mass end occupied by elliptical galaxies. Although previous…
In our modern understanding of galaxy formation, every galaxy forms within a dark matter halo. The formation and growth of galaxies over time is connected to the growth of the halos in which they form. The advent of large galaxy surveys as…
Super-massive black holes, with masses larger than a million times that of the Sun, appear to inhabit the centers of all massive galaxies. Cosmologically-motivated theories of galaxy formation need feedback from these super-massive black…
Understanding the processes that drive the formation of black holes (BHs) is a key topic in observational cosmology. While the observed $M_{\mathrm{BH}}$--$M_{\mathrm{Bulge}}$ correlation in bulge-dominated galaxies is thought to be…
We consider the cosmological model in which a part of the Universe \Omega_h\sim 10^-5 is in the form of primordial black holes with mass \sim 10^5M_\odot. These primordial black holes would be centers for growing protogalaxies which…
Formation process(es) of galactic bulges are not yet clarified although several mechanisms have been proposed. In a previous study, we suggested one possibility that galactic bulges have been formed from the cold gas inflowing through…
The formation of galaxies can be understood in terms of the assembly patterns of each type of galactic component. To perform this kind of analysis, is necessary to define some criteria to separate those components. Decomposition methods…
Supermassive black holes have been detected in all galaxies that contain bulge components when the galaxies observed were close enough so that the searches were feasible. Together with the observation that bigger black holes live in bigger…
As galaxy formation and evolution over long cosmic time-scales depends to a large degree on the structure of the universe, the assembly history of galaxies is potentially a powerful approach for learning about the universe itself. In this…
Galaxies with the mass of the Milky Way dominate the stellar mass density of the Universe but it is uncertain how and when they were assembled. Here we study progenitors of these galaxies out to z=2.5, using data from the 3D-HST and CANDELS…
We use a series of high-resolution simulations of a `Milky-Way' halo coupled to semi-analytic methods to study the formation of our own Galaxy and of its stellar halo. The physical properties of our model Milky Way, as well as the age and…