Related papers: omega-Cen - an Ultra Compact Dwarf Galaxy ?
A key obstacle to understanding the galaxy merger rate and its role in galaxy evolution is the difficulty in constraining the merger properties and time-scales from instantaneous snapshots of the real universe.The most common way to…
Recent observations indicate that the progenitors of globular clusters (GCs) at high redshifts had high average stellar surface densities above $10^5\, \mathrm{M}_\odot\, \mathrm{pc}^{-2}$. The internal structure and kinematics of the…
We have simulated the growth of structure in two 100 Mpc boxes for LCDM and SCDM universes. These N-body/SPH simulations include a gaseous component which is able to cool radiatively. A fraction of the gas cools into cold dense objects…
The motion of S2, one of the stars closest to the Galactic Centre, has been measured accurately and used to study the compact object at the centre of the Milky Way. It is commonly accepted that this object is a supermassive black hole but…
Recent radio-frequency probes, with the ATCA and ASKAP telescopes, have proven themselves to be at the forefront of placing indirect limits on the properties of dark matter. The latter being able to substantially exceed the constraining…
Recent spectroscopic observations of galaxies in the Fornax-Cluster reveal nearly unresolved `star-like' objects with red-shifts appropriate to the Fornax-Cluster. These objects have intrinsic sizes of about 100 pc and absolute B-band…
We discuss how the centres of galaxy clusters evolve in time, showing the results of a series of direct N-body simulations. In particular, we followed the evolution of a galaxy cluster with a mass $M_{clus} \simeq 10^{14} $M$_{\odot}$ in…
The X-ray emission from clusters of galaxies enables them to be used as good cosmological probes and as an example for massive galaxy formation. The gas mass fraction in clusters should be a universal standard which by means of Chandra…
We report on work in progress by the Virgo consortium, a collaboration set up to carry out large simulations of the formation of galaxies and large-scale structure exploiting the latest generation of parallel supercomputers. We show results…
In this white paper we focus on compact stellar systems, star clusters, nuclear star clusters (NSCs), stripped nuclei, and ultra-compact dwarfs (UCDs), as engines of galaxy evolution and black-hole growth. We show how the same capability…
We report on work done by the Virgo consortium, an international collaboration set up in order to study the formation and evolution of Large Scale Structure using N-body simulations on the latest generation of parallel supercomputers. We…
In gaussian theories of structure formation, the galaxy cluster abundance is an extremely sensitive probe of the density fluctuation power spectrum and of the density parameter, $\Omega$. We develop this theme by deriving and studying in…
In this paper we present the results of two detailed N-body simulations of the interaction of a sample of four massive globular clusters in the inner region of a triaxial galaxy. A full merging of the clusters takes place, leading to a…
We show that the counts of galaxy clusters in future deep cluster surveys can place strong constraints on the matter density, Omega_m, the vacuum energy density, Omega_L, and the normalization of the matter power spectrum, sigma_8.…
We investigate, using high resolution N-body simulations, the density profiles and the morphologies of galaxy clusters in three models of structure formation. We show that these properties are closely related to the occurrence of a…
We suggest a possible mechanism of ultra diffuse galaxy formation: the UDGs may occur as a result of a central collision of galaxies. If the galaxies are young and contain a lot of gas, the collision may kick all the gas off the systems and…
Nuclear star clusters (NSCs) are the densest stellar systems in the Universe. They can be found at the center of all galaxy types, but tend to favor galaxies of intermediate stellar mass around 10$^9\,$M$_{\odot}$[1, 2]. Currently, two main…
Nuclear star clusters (NSCs) are dense star clusters located at the centre of galaxies spanning a wide range of masses and morphologies. Analysing NSC occupation statistics in different environments provides an invaluable window into…
We present a two-band, wide-field imaging survey of an X-ray selected sample of 78 clusters in the redshift range z=0.03-0.07. The aim of the project is to provide the astronomical community with a complete set of homogeneous, CCD-based,…
We identify gravitationally bound structures in the Ursa Major region using positions, velocities and photometry from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS DR7) and the Third Reference Catalogue of Bright Galaxies (RC3). A friends-of-friends…