Related papers: Massive spheroids can form in single minor mergers
We examine the properties of a morphologically-selected sample of 0.4<z<1.0 spheroidal galaxies in the GOODS fields in order to ascertain whether their increase in abundance with time arises primarily from mergers. To address this question…
We analyze the projected axial ratio distribution, p(b/a), of galaxies that were spectroscopically selected from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (DR6) to have low star-formation rates. For these quiescent galaxies we find a rather abrupt…
Dwarf galaxies (M*<10^9 Msun) are key drivers of mass assembly in high mass galaxies, but relatively little is understood about the assembly of dwarf galaxies themselves. Using the \textsc{NewHorizon} cosmological simulation (40 pc spatial…
The evolution of our Universe is strongly influenced by the attractive force of gravity. A key aspect of this evolution, therefore, is the merging of galaxies. Here, we explore the role of mergers in shaping the properties of massive…
The genesis of spheroids is central to our understanding of galaxy formation -- they are relatively simple systems, containing about half the stellar mass of the Universe. A major subset of spheroids, massive elliptical galaxies, are…
The standard disc formation scenario postulates that disc forms as the gas cools and flows into the centre of the dark matter halo, conserving the specific angular momentum. Major mergers have been shown to be able to destroy or highly…
Galaxy merging is a fundamental aspect of the standard hierarchical galaxy formation paradigm. Recently, the Galaxy Zoo project has compiled a large, homogeneous catalogue of 3373 mergers, through direct visual inspection of the entire SDSS…
The massive galaxies in the young universe, ten billion years ago, formed stars at surprising intensities. Although this is commonly attributed to violent mergers, the properties of many of these galaxies are incompatible with such events,…
We study the significance of major-merger-driven star formation in the early Universe, by quantifying the contribution of this process to the total star formation budget in 80 massive (M* > 10^10 MSun) galaxies at z~2. Employing…
We revisit collisionless major and minor mergers of spheroidal galaxies in the context of the size evolution of elliptical galaxies. The simulations are performed as a series of mergers with mass-ratios of 1:1 and 1:10 for models…
Galaxy mergers are a fundamental part of galaxy evolution. To study the resulting mass distributions of different kinds of galaxy mergers, we present a simulation suite of 36 high-resolution isolated merger simulations, exploring a wide…
It is now well known that certain massive galaxies undergo enormous enhancements in their SFR when they undergo major mergers(100x). To analyse the SF enhancement and AGN fraction evolution during the merger process, we use a more…
We study the significance of mergers in the quenching of star formation in galaxies at z~1 by examining their color-mass distributions for different morphology types. We perform two-dimensional light profile fits to GOODS iz images of ~5000…
Recent observations of UV-/optically selected, massive star forming galaxies at z~2 indicate that the baryonic mass assembly and star formation history is dominated by continuous rapid accretion of gas and internal secular evolution, rather…
We report first results from a series of N-body/gasdynamical simulations designed to study the origin of galaxy morphologies in a cold dark matter-dominated universe. The simulations include star formation and feedback and have numerical…
We summarize current models of the formation of spheroidal stellar systems. Whereas globular clusters form in an efficient mode of star formation inside turbulent molecular clouds, the origin of galactic spheroids, that is bulges, dwarf…
Massive galaxies with a half-mass radius <~ 1kpc are observed in the early universe (z~>2), but not in the local universe. In the local universe similar-mass (within a factor of two) galaxies tend to be a factor of 4 to 5 larger. Dry minor…
A key unresolved question is the role that galaxy mergers play in driving stellar mass growth over cosmic time. Recent observational work hints at the possibility that the overall contribution of `major' mergers (mass ratios $\gtrsim$1:4)…
More than half of all stars in the local Universe are found in massive spheroidal galaxies, which are characterized by old stellar populations with little or no current star formation. In present models, such galaxies appear rather late as…
We study the infall of a subhalo in its parent halo due to dynamical friction. Using expected mass and spatial distributions of subhaloes, in unison with the derived infall time-scale, we calculate the expected merger stellar mass growth…