Unveiling M33's Hidden Merger History: A Potential Population of Star Clusters on Retrograde Orbits
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arXiv
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| Autori principali: | , , |
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| Natura: | Preprint |
| Pubblicazione: |
2025
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| _version_ | 1866911063309549568 |
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| author | Anguiano, Borja Lewis, Geraint F. Majewski, Steven R. |
| author_facet | Anguiano, Borja Lewis, Geraint F. Majewski, Steven R. |
| contents | We report the discovery of a possible sub-population of stellar clusters that appear to follow retrograde orbits around the third largest galaxy in the Local Group, M33 (Triangulum). This spiral disk galaxy has apparently had a mostly quiescent existence, although recent discoveries, particularly of a pronounced warp in the gas and stellar disk, suggest that M33's relatively quiet past was interrupted at least once by a dynamical interaction with another galaxy. We suggest that this sub population provides evidence of accretion of one or more dwarf galaxies in M33's history. We estimate a lower limit for the accreted halo virial mass of $M_{\rm vir} \sim (7 \pm 3) \times 10^{10}$\msun, accounting for about 10\% of the virial mass in the halo of M33 that has an accretion origin. We propose one of these accretion events as the source of the observed warp in M33's disk. |
| format | Preprint |
| id |
arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2507_13488 |
| institution | arXiv |
| publishDate | 2025 |
| record_format | arxiv |
| spellingShingle | Unveiling M33's Hidden Merger History: A Potential Population of Star Clusters on Retrograde Orbits Anguiano, Borja Lewis, Geraint F. Majewski, Steven R. Astrophysics of Galaxies We report the discovery of a possible sub-population of stellar clusters that appear to follow retrograde orbits around the third largest galaxy in the Local Group, M33 (Triangulum). This spiral disk galaxy has apparently had a mostly quiescent existence, although recent discoveries, particularly of a pronounced warp in the gas and stellar disk, suggest that M33's relatively quiet past was interrupted at least once by a dynamical interaction with another galaxy. We suggest that this sub population provides evidence of accretion of one or more dwarf galaxies in M33's history. We estimate a lower limit for the accreted halo virial mass of $M_{\rm vir} \sim (7 \pm 3) \times 10^{10}$\msun, accounting for about 10\% of the virial mass in the halo of M33 that has an accretion origin. We propose one of these accretion events as the source of the observed warp in M33's disk. |
| title | Unveiling M33's Hidden Merger History: A Potential Population of Star Clusters on Retrograde Orbits |
| topic | Astrophysics of Galaxies |
| url | https://arxiv.org/abs/2507.13488 |