Related papers: Galactokinetics
The Galactic disk retains a vast amount of information about how it came to be, and how it evolved over cosmic time. However, we know very little about the secular processes associated with disk evolution. One major uncertainty is the…
Disk galaxies evolve over time through processes that may rearrange both the radial mass profile and the metallicity distribution within the disk. This review of such slow changes is largely, though not entirely, restricted to…
After explaining the motivation for this article, I briefly recapitulate the methods used to determine, somewhat coarsely, the rotation curves of our Milky Way Galaxy and other spiral galaxies, especially in their outer parts, and the…
A new idea is proposed for the origin of bulges in spiral galaxies. Numerical simulations for the protogalactic collapse suggest strongly that galactic bulges have been assembled from massive clumps formed in the galactic disks in their…
Observations show that radial metallicity gradients in disk galaxies are relatively shallow, if not flat, especially at large galactocentric distances and for galaxies in the high-redshift universe. Given that star formation and metal…
In previous galactic dynamo theories of the origin of the magnetic field in our galaxy, the subject of flux-freezing has been omitted. As a consequence, the equation of mass flow has generally also been omitted, particularly in the halo…
By numerically solving the mass distribution in a rotating disk based on Newton's laws of motion and gravitation, we demonstrate that the observed flat rotation curves for most spiral galaxies correspond to exponentially decreasing mass…
We present a method for recovering the distribution functions of edge-on thin axisymmetric disks directly from their observable kinematic properties. The most generally observable properties of such a stellar system are the line-of-sight…
Deep photometric surveys of the Milky Way have revealed diffuse structures encircling our Galaxy far beyond the "classical" limits of the stellar disk. This paper reviews results from our own and other observational programs, which together…
Low mass, self-gravitating accretion disks admit quasi-steady,`gravito-turbulent' states in which cooling balances turbulent viscous heating. However, numerical simulations show that gravito-turbulence cannot be sustained beyond dynamical…
Galaxy disks evolve through angular momentum transfers between sub-components, like gas, stars, or dark matter halos, through non axi-symmetric instabilities. The speed of this evolution is boosted in presence of a large fraction of cold…
We present a kinetic theory for the evolution of the phase-space distribution of dark matter particles in galaxy halos in the presence of a cosmological spectrum of fluctuations. This theory introduces a new way to model the formation and…
The bulk of old stars in the Galactic disk have migrated radially by up to several kpc in their lifetimes, yet the disk has remained relatively cool, i.e., the ratio of radial heating to migration has been small. Here, we demonstrate that…
A set of equations is derived describing the macroscopic transport of particles and energy in a thermonuclear plasma on the energy confinement time. The equations thus derived allow studying collisional and turbulent transport…
Stellar systems - star clusters, galaxies, dark matter haloes, and so on - are ubiquitous characters in the evolutionary tale of our Universe. This tutorial article is an introduction to the collective dynamical evolution of the very large…
Evolution of galaxies is one of the most actual topics in astrophysics. Among the most important factors determining the evolution are two galactic components which are difficult or even impossible to detect optically: the gaseous disks and…
The driving of turbulence in galaxies is deeply connected with the physics of feedback, star formation, outflows, accretion, and radial transport in disks. The velocity dispersion of gas in galaxies therefore offers a promising…
We present a simplified model in which we suggest that two important galactic problems -the magnetic field configuration at large scales and the flat rotation curve- may be simultaneously explained. A highly convective disc produces a high…
The formation of disk galaxies is one of the most outstanding problems in modern astrophysics and cosmology. We review the progress made by numerical simulations carried out on large parallel supercomputers. Recent progress stems from a…
We introduce a new model for the structure and evolution of the gas in galactic discs. In the model the gas is in vertical pressure and energy balance. Star formation feedback injects energy and momentum, and non-axisymmetric torques…