Related papers: Measuring the Matter Density of the Galactic Disk …
We explore the relation between the stellar mass surface density and the mass surface density of molecular hydrogen gas in twelve nearby molecular clouds that are located at $<$1.5 kpc distance. The sample clouds span an order of magnitude…
We use Gaia photometry and astrometry to estimate the vertical spatial structure of the Milky Way at the Solar radius, formally accounting for sample incompleteness (the selection function) and parallax measurement uncertainty. Our results…
We present a novel method for determining the surface density of protoplanetary disks through consideration of disk 'dust lines' which indicate the observed disk radial scale at different observational wavelengths. This method relies on the…
Extended halo tidal streams from disrupting Milky Way satellites offer new opportunities for gauging fundamental Galactic parameters without challenging observations of the Galactic center. In the roughly spherical Galactic potential tidal…
In this fourth article on weighing the Galactic disk using the shape of the phase-space spiral, we have tested our method on a billion particle three-dimensional N-body simulation, comprised of a Milky Way like host galaxy and a merging…
A typical galactic disc has a finite thickness and in addition to stars it also contains a finite amount of interstellar gas. Here, we investigate the physical impact of the finite thickness of a galactic disc on the disc stability against…
We apply the vertical Jeans equation to the kinematics of Milky Way stars in the solar neighbourhood to measure the local dark matter density. More than 90,000 G- and K-type dwarf stars are selected from the cross-matched sample of LAMOST…
We calculate the mean density profiles for luminous and dark matter on distance scales $D \sim(1 - 100)$ Mpc around us using recent all-sky catalogs of galaxy groups. Within the Local Volume $( D < 11 ~\rm Mpc)$ we derived the mean stellar…
We apply the automatic stellar stream detection algorithm StarStream to Gaia Data Release 3 and identify 87 stellar streams associated with Galactic globular clusters (GCs), including 34 high-quality cases with median completeness and…
We analyze the relationship between the mass of a spherical component and the minimum possible thickness of stable stellar disks. This relationship for real galaxies allows the lower limit on the dark halo mass to be estimated (the thinner…
Large stellar surveys are sensitive to interstellar dust through the effects of reddening. Using extinctions measured from photometry and spectroscopy, together with three-dimensional (3D) positions of individual stars, it is possible to…
We present the recent robust determination of the value of the Dark Matter density at the Sun's location ($\rho_\odot$) with a technique that does not rely on a global mass-modeling of the Galaxy. The method is based on the local equation…
The dark matter subhalos orbiting in a galactic halo perturb the orbits of stars in thin stellar streams. Over time the random velocities in the streams develop non-Gaussian wings. The rate of velocity increase is approximately a random…
We present an approach to measure the Milky Way (MW) potential using the angular accelerations of stars in aggregate as measured by astrometric surveys like Gaia. Accelerations directly probe the gradient of the MW potential, as opposed to…
We present a novel method to accurately measure the galaxy stellar mass function (GSMF) based upon the Photometric objects Around Cosmic webs (PAC) method developed in our first paper (Paper I) of the series. The method allows us to measure…
I review current efforts to measure the mean density of dark matter near the Sun. This encodes valuable dynamical information about our Galaxy and is also of great importance for 'direct detection' dark matter experiments. I discuss…
CONTEXT. The maximum size of the Galactic stellar disk is not yet known. Some studies have suggested an abrupt drop-off of the stellar density of the disk at Galactocentric distances $R\gtrsim 15$ kpc, which means that in practice no disk…
Most of the visible mass in a typical spiral galaxy is distributed in a thin disk, with a radial extent much larger than its thickness. While the planar disk structure, including non-axisymmetric features such as spiral structure, has been…
Star formation depends on the available gaseous "fuel" as well as galactic environment, with higher specific star formation rates where gas is predominantly molecular and where stellar (and dark matter) densities are higher. The partition…
The existence of dark matter in the Galactic disk has been a topic of significant debate, especially over the past two decades. Evidence for dark matter in the disk, a component in addition to the now well-proven dark matter halo, has been…