Related papers: Accretion by Galaxies
The ability to resolve all processes which drive galaxy formation is one of the most fundamental goals in extragalactic astronomy. While star formation rates and the merger history are now measured with increasingly high certainty, the role…
This paper discusses how cosmic gas accretion controls star formation, and summarizes the physical properties expected for the cosmic gas accreted by galaxies. The paper also collects observational evidence for gas accretion sustaining star…
Young stars and planetary systems form in molecular clouds. For classical T Tauri stars (CTTS, F-K type precursors) the accretion disk does not reach down to the central star, but it is truncated near the co-rotation radius. The inner edge…
Accretion of matter onto a magnetic, rotating object can be strongly affected by the interaction with its magnetic field. This occurs in a variety of astrophysical settings involving young stellar objects, white dwarfs, and neutron stars.…
We perform $N$-body simulations of star clusters in time-dependant galactic potentials. Since the Milky Way was built-up through mergers with dwarf galaxies, its globular cluster population is made up of clusters formed both during the…
A central tenet of the current cosmological paradigm is that galaxies grow over time through the accretion of smaller systems. Here, we present new kinematic measurements near the centre of one of the densest pronounced substructures, the…
We present here a new determination of the ratio of energies radiated by active galactic nuclei and by stars and discuss the reasons for the apparently conflicting results found in previous studies. We conclude that the energy radiated by…
Supermassive black holes in galaxy centres can grow by the accretion of gas, liberating energy that might regulate star formation on galaxy-wide scales. The nature of the gaseous fuel reservoirs that power black hole growth is nevertheless…
Both gas accretion (infall) and winds (outflow) change a galaxy's metallicity and gas fraction, lowering the effective yield. Low effective yields in galaxies with rotation speeds < 120 km/s have been widely interpreted as the onset of…
Chandra observations of elliptical galaxies have revealed large numbers of Low Mass X-ray Binaries (LMXBs) accreting at rates above 10^-9 solar masses per year. One scenario which generates this transfer rate from an old stellar population…
Spectral and kinematic studies suggest that the nonthermal radio source Sgr A*, located at the center of the Milky Way, is a supermassive compact object with a mass 2-3 million solar masses. Winds from nearby stars, located approximately…
Theory and observations agree that the accreted stellar halos (ASHs) of Milky Way-like galaxies display significant scatter. I take advantage of this stochasticity to invert the link between halo assembly history (HAH) and ASH, using mock…
Cosmological accretion shocks created during the formation of galaxy clusters are a ubiquitous phenomenon all around the Universe. These shocks, and their features, are intimately related with the gravitational energy put into play during…
Globular clusters (GCs) provide statistically significant coeval populations of stars spanning various evolutionary stages, allowing robust constraints on stellar evolution model parameters and ages. We analyze eight old Milky Way GCs with…
We analyze an adaptive mesh refinement hydrodynamic cosmological simulation of a Milky Way-sized galaxy to study the cold gas in the halo. HI observations of the Milky Way and other nearby spirals have revealed the presence of such gas in…
In this paper we quantify the gas accretion rate from minor mergers onto star-forming galaxies in the Local Universe using HI observations of 148 nearby spiral galaxies (WHISP sample). We developed a dedicated code that iteratively analyses…
The assembly of stellar-dominated cores in elliptical galaxies is key to understanding how cosmic structures evolved. Gravitational lensing offers unique insights into the nature of their stars. We report the discovery of the smallest known…
The age distribution, and chemical elemental abundances, of stars in the halo of the Milky Way provide constraints on theories of galaxy formation. As one specific example, the accretion of satellite galaxies similar to the present retinue…
Can the present dynamics of spiral galaxies tell us something about the merging history, the formation and evolution of disks? Galaxy interactions thicken or destroy disks; the simultaneous presence of thick and thin disks is a tracer of…
The variation of metal production over time and its dilution in the interstellar medium depend on the star formation and gas accretion rates. Measuring age-chemistry relations across the Milky Way disk provides key constraints on the gas…