Related papers: The Faintest Dwarf Galaxies
The population of Milky Way satellite galaxies is of great interest for cosmology, fundamental physics, and astrophysics. They represent the faint end of the galaxy luminosity function, are the most dark-matter dominated objects in the…
Ultrafaint dwarf (UFD) galaxies are dominated by dark matter, the distribution of which may be inferred from the kinematics of that galaxy's stellar population. Star-by-star observations are available for the satellite UFD galaxies of the…
We present deep Hubble Space Telescope imaging of five faint dwarf galaxies associated with the nearby spiral NGC 253 (D$\approx$3.5 Mpc). Three of these are newly discovered ultra-faint dwarf galaxies, while all five were found in the…
In the last decade, we have been able to probe further down the galaxy luminosity function than ever before and expand into the regime of ultra-faint dwarfs (UFDs), which are some of the best probes we have of small-scale cosmology and…
The smallest dwarf galaxies are the most straight forward objects in which to study star formation processes on a galactic scale. They are typically single cell star forming entities, and as small potentials in orbit around a much larger…
The stellar initial mass function at high redshift is an important defining property of the first stellar systems to form and may also play a role in various dark matter problems. We here determine the faint stellar luminosity function in…
Ultra-faint dwarf galaxies (UFDs) are newcomers among galaxies, and are the faintest galaxies in the observed universe. To date, they have only been found around the Milky Way Galaxy and M31 in the Local Group. We present the discovery of…
We combine the six high-resolution Aquarius dark matter simulations with a semi-analytic galaxy formation model to investigate the properties of the satellites of Milky Way-like galaxies. We find good correspondence with the observed…
A galaxy's mean metallicity is usually closely correlated with its luminosity and mass. Consequently the most metal-poor galaxies in the local universe are dwarf galaxies. Blue compact dwarfs and tidal dwarfs tend to deviate from the…
Low-mass dwarf galaxies are very sensitive test-beds for theories of cosmic structure formation since their weak gravitational fields allow the effects of the relevant physical processes to clearly stand out. Up to now, no unified account…
The dwarf spheroidal satellite galaxies of the Milky Way are some of the most dark-matter-dominated objects known. Due to their proximity, high dark matter content, and lack of astrophysical backgrounds, dwarf spheroidal galaxies are widely…
Luminosity Functions have been obtained for very faint dwarf galaxies in the cores of four rich clusters of galaxies (Abell 2052, 2107, 2199 and 2666). It is found that the luminosity function of dwarf galaxies rises very steeply in these…
Dwarf spheroidal galaxies are the most insignificant extragalactic stellar systems in terms of their visibility, but potentially very significant in terms of their role in the formation and evolution of much more luminous galaxies. We…
Gamma-ray searches for dark matter annihilation and decay in dwarf galaxies rely on an understanding of the dark matter density profiles of these systems. Conversely, uncertainties in these density profiles propagate into the derived…
The Milky Way has at least twenty-three known satellite galaxies that shine with luminosities ranging from about a thousand to a billion times that of the Sun. Half of these galaxies were discovered in the past few years in the Sloan…
We study the abundance of satellites akin to the brightest, classical dwarf spheroidals around galaxies similar in magnitude and isolation to the Milky Way and M31 in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. From a combination of photometric and…
The population of Milky Way (MW) satellites contains the faintest known galaxies and thus provides essential insight into galaxy formation and dark matter microphysics. Here we combine a model of the galaxy--halo connection with newly…
The predominantly ancient stellar populations observed in the lowest-mass galaxies (i.e. ultra-faint dwarfs) suggest that their star formation was suppressed by reionization. Most of the well-studied ultra-faint dwarfs, however, are within…
We present a detailed chemical abundance and kinematic analysis of six extremely metal-poor ($-4.2 \leq$ [Fe/H] $\leq-$2.9) halo stars with very low neutron-capture abundances ([Sr/H] and [Ba/H]) based on high-resolution Magellan/MIKE…
As part of the Dwarf galaxies Abundances and Radial-velocities Team (DART) program, we have measured the metallicities of a large sample of stars in four nearby dwarf spheroidal galaxies (dSph's): Sculptor, Sextans, Fornax, and Carina. The…