The orbital anisotropy profile of the Gaia-Sausage/Enceladus accretion remnant
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arXiv
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2025
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| _version_ | 1866909771333894144 |
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| author | Lane, James M. M. Bovy, Jo |
| author_facet | Lane, James M. M. Bovy, Jo |
| contents | The Gaia-Sausage/Enceladus (GS/E) accretion remnant is one of the most important stellar populations in the Milky Way halo. Recent simulation-based work has suggested that the anisotropy profiles of remnants like GS/E decline towards the center and may be well-fit by an Osipkov-Merritt-type distribution function (DF). We study the anisotropy profile of GS/E using a chemically-selected sample of stars from APOGEE DR17 and Gaia. We find that the anisotropy profile of GS/E is high and constant with $β\sim 0.9$ beyond 8 kpc, dropping to $β\sim 0.4$ at 2 kpc. We fit a two-component Osipkov-Merritt anisotropy profile to the GS/E data, finding that a combination of profiles with scale radii $r_{\mathrm{a}}=2$ kpc and 547 kpc, with a mixture fraction $k_\mathrm{om} = 0.88$ provide a better fit to the data than a constant anisotropy profile. Using this new DF, we re-assess the density profile and mass of the GS/E remnant from a previous work that assumed a contant-anisotropy DF, finding an increase in the derived mass from $1.5\times 10^{8}~\mathrm{M}_{\odot}$ to $2.29 ^{+0.95}_{-0.63}\times 10^{8}~\mathrm{M}_{\odot}$. In general, the combination Osipkov-Merritt DF more satisfactorily matches the kinematics of the GS/E remnant than the constant anisotropy DF, and in the future will form a more reliable basis for modelling the remnant. Additionally, these new constraints on the kinematics of GS/E near the Galactic center are an important measurement for any future theoretical or simulation-based investigation into its nature and origin. |
| format | Preprint |
| id |
arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2509_04557 |
| institution | arXiv |
| publishDate | 2025 |
| record_format | arxiv |
| spellingShingle | The orbital anisotropy profile of the Gaia-Sausage/Enceladus accretion remnant Lane, James M. M. Bovy, Jo Astrophysics of Galaxies The Gaia-Sausage/Enceladus (GS/E) accretion remnant is one of the most important stellar populations in the Milky Way halo. Recent simulation-based work has suggested that the anisotropy profiles of remnants like GS/E decline towards the center and may be well-fit by an Osipkov-Merritt-type distribution function (DF). We study the anisotropy profile of GS/E using a chemically-selected sample of stars from APOGEE DR17 and Gaia. We find that the anisotropy profile of GS/E is high and constant with $β\sim 0.9$ beyond 8 kpc, dropping to $β\sim 0.4$ at 2 kpc. We fit a two-component Osipkov-Merritt anisotropy profile to the GS/E data, finding that a combination of profiles with scale radii $r_{\mathrm{a}}=2$ kpc and 547 kpc, with a mixture fraction $k_\mathrm{om} = 0.88$ provide a better fit to the data than a constant anisotropy profile. Using this new DF, we re-assess the density profile and mass of the GS/E remnant from a previous work that assumed a contant-anisotropy DF, finding an increase in the derived mass from $1.5\times 10^{8}~\mathrm{M}_{\odot}$ to $2.29 ^{+0.95}_{-0.63}\times 10^{8}~\mathrm{M}_{\odot}$. In general, the combination Osipkov-Merritt DF more satisfactorily matches the kinematics of the GS/E remnant than the constant anisotropy DF, and in the future will form a more reliable basis for modelling the remnant. Additionally, these new constraints on the kinematics of GS/E near the Galactic center are an important measurement for any future theoretical or simulation-based investigation into its nature and origin. |
| title | The orbital anisotropy profile of the Gaia-Sausage/Enceladus accretion remnant |
| topic | Astrophysics of Galaxies |
| url | https://arxiv.org/abs/2509.04557 |