Related papers: Expectations from Realistic Microlensing Models of…
I obtain an upper limit for the optical depth to microlensing toward Baade's Window of $3\times 10^{-6}$ by assuming that all of the mass of the Galaxy interior to the Sun (and not in the bulge) is in a disk. The exponential scale height of…
The cold dark matter (CDM) cosmology, which is the standard theory of the structure formation in the universe, predicts that the outer density profile of dark matter halos decreases with the cube of distance from the center. However, so far…
The lightcurve of PA-99-N2, one of the recently announced microlensing candidates towards M31, shows small deviations from the standard Paczynski form. We explore a number of possible explanations, including correlations with the seeing,…
Disk-halo models of the Galaxy and LMC are constructed and used to analyse the microlensing data-set. Deflectors in the LMC bar, disk and halo provide an optical depth to microlensing of $\sim 2 \times 10^{-7}$. Deflectors in the Galactic…
For the past five seasons, the Angstrom Project, an international microlensing collaboration, has been making observations of the central bulge of M31, the Andromeda galaxy, searching for microlensing events. This thesis describes the work…
We present detailed maps of the microlensing optical depth and event density over an area of 195 sq. deg towards the Galactic bulge. The maps are computed from synthetic stellar catalogues generated from the Besancon Galaxy Model, which…
I discuss current and future applications of pixel lensing: the microlensing of unresolved stars. Pixel lensing is the tool of choice for studying the Macho dark matter content of external galaxies like Andromeda (M31), and is at the heart…
Microlensing is the tool of choice for the search and the analysis of compact halo objects ("MACHOs"), a still viable class of dark matter candidates at the galactic scale. Different analyses point towards an agreement in excluding dark…
The Andromeda (M31) galaxy subtends nearly 100 sq. deg. on the sky, with severe contamination from the Milky Way halo stars whose surface density displays a steep gradient across the entire M31 field-of-view. Planetary Nebulae (PNe) are a…
We analyze the first-year MACHO collaboration observations of microlensing towards the Galactic center using a new direct likelihood technique that is sensitive to the distribution of the events on the sky. We consider the full set of 41…
We present a suite of semi-analytic disk-bulge-halo models for the Andromeda galaxy (M31) which satisfy three fundamental conditions: (1) internal self-consistency; (2) consistency with observational data; and (3) stability of the disk…
We present the discovery of three faint dwarf galaxies and a globular cluster in the halo of the Andromeda galaxy (M31), found in our MegaCam survey that spans the southern quadrant of M31, from a projected distance of ~50 kpc to \~150 kpc.…
We report the detection of a 282 $^{+34}_{-31}$ pc-sized core in the center of Milky Way dark matter halo at $68\%$ confidence level by using the micro-lensing event rate sky map data from the Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment (OGLE)…
The observed microlensing events towards the LMC do not have yet a coherent explanation. If they are due to Galactic Halo objects, the nature of these objects is puzzling --- half the halo in dark 0.5 Msol objects. On the other hand,…
The number and properties of observed gravitational microlensing events depend on the distribution and kinematics of stars and other compact objects along the line of sight. In particular, precise measurements of the microlensing optical…
We present the surface brightness profile of M31's stellar halo out to a projected radius of 175 kpc. The surface brightness estimates are based on confirmed samples of M31 red giant branch stars derived from Keck/DEIMOS spectroscopic…
We present updated microlensing analysis results based on high-cadence ($\sim$2~min) Subaru Hyper Suprime-Cam (HSC) observations of the Andromeda Galaxy (M31) in 2014, 2017, and 2020, yielding a total of 39.3 hours of data. We use a…
The POINT-AGAPE collaboration is currently searching for massive compact halo objects (MACHOs) towards the Andromeda galaxy (M31). The survey aims to exploit the high inclination of the M31 disk, which causes an asymmetry in the spatial…
We reproduce the rotation curve of the Andromeda galaxy (M31) by taking into account its bulge, disk, and halo components, considering the last one to contain the major part of dark matter mass. Hence, our prescription is to split the…
We discuss the results of the MEGA microlensing campaign towards M31. Our analysis is based on an analytical evaluation of the microlensing rate, taking into account the observational efficiency as given by the MEGA collaboration. In…