Related papers: Substructure in Dark Halos: Orbital Eccentricities…
The Milky Way contains several distinct old stellar components that provide a fossil record of its formation. We can understand their spatial distribution and kinematics in a hierarchical formation scenario by associating the proto-galactic…
A theory is developed for the dynamics of eccentric perturbations $[\propto \exp(\pm i\phi)]$ of a disk galaxy residing in a spherical dark matter halo and including a spherical bulge component. The disk is represented as a large number $N$…
We study how structural properties of globular clusters and dwarf galaxies are linked to their orbits in the Milky Way halo. From the inner to the outer halo, orbital energy increases and stellar-systems gradually move out of internal…
The evolution of a small satellite inside a more massive truncated isothermal spherical halo is studied using both the Theory of Linear Response for dynamical friction and N-Body simulations. The analytical approach includes the effects of…
The hierarchical mergers that form the haloes of dark matter surrounding galaxies, groups and clusters are not entirely efficient, leaving substantial amounts of dense substructure, in the form of stripped halo cores or `subhaloes',…
The velocity, position, and action variable evolution of a tidal stream drawn out of a star cluster in a triaxial isochrone potential containing a sub-halo population reproduces many of the orbital effects of more general cosmological halos…
The velocity anisotropy of particles inside dark matter (DM) haloes is an important physical quantity, which is required for the accurate modelling of mass profiles of galaxies and clusters of galaxies. It is typically measured using the…
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…
We discuss evidence in local, present-day clusters of galaxies (from the ENACS survey) about the way in which those clusters have evolved and about the evolutionary relationships between the galaxies of different morphological types in…
Open star clusters are dynamic systems whose evolution is critically influenced by initial conditions such as star formation efficiency and orbital parameters. Understanding their dissolution mechanisms provides insight into stellar…
We present a preliminary analysis of the effect of dynamical friction on the orbits of part of the globular clusters in our Galaxy. Our study considers an anisotropic velocity dispersion field approximated using the results of studies in…
We study the formation of the Milky Way's halo in a $\Lambda$CDM cosmology by scaling down a high resolution simulation of the formation of a cluster of galaxies. We determine how much phase-space substructure is left over from the objects…
How fast a satellite decays its orbit depends on how slowly its mass is lost by tide. Motivated by inner halo satellite remnants like the Sgr and Omega Cen, we develop fully analytical models to study the orbital decay and tidal massloss of…
We present a scenario for the production of dynamically cold rings around the Milky Way via a high-eccentricity, flyby encounter. These initial conditions are more cosmologically motivated than those considered in previous works. We find…
Since exoplanets were detected using the radial velocity method, they have revealed a diverse distribution of orbital configurations. Amongst these are planets in highly eccentric orbits (e > 0.5). Most of these systems consist of a single…
We investigate the ability of basis function expansions to reproduce the evolution of a Milky Way-like dark matter halo, extracted from a cosmological zoom-in simulation. For each snapshot, the density of the halo is reduced to a basis…
Halo stars orbit within the potential of the Milky Way and hence their kinematics can be used to understand the underlying mass distribution. However, the inferred mass distribution depends sensitively upon assumptions made on the density…
The inspiral of a turbulent molecular cloud in the Galactic Centre may result in the formation of a small, dense and moderately eccentric gas disc around the supermassive black hole (SMBH). Such a disc is unstable to fragmentation and may…
We study the evolution of star clusters on circular and eccentric orbits using direct $N$-body simulations. We model clusters with initially $N=8{\rm k}$ and $N=16{\rm k}$ single stars of the same mass, orbiting around a point-mass galaxy.…
Using test particle simulations we examine the structure of the outer Galactic disk as it is perturbed by a satellite in a tight eccentric orbit about the Galaxy. A satellite of mass a few times 10^9 Msol can heat the outer Galactic disk,…