298 research outputs found
The Dynamical Implications of Multiple Stellar Formation Events in Galactic Globular Clusters
Various galactic globular clusters display abundance anomalies that affect
the morphology of their colour-magnitude diagrams. In this paper we consider
the possibility of helium enhancement in the anomalous horizontal branch of NGC
2808. We examine the dynamics of a self-enrichment scenario in which an initial
generation of stars with a top-heavy initial mass function enriches the
interstellar medium with helium via the low-velocity ejecta of its asymptotic
giant branch stars. This enriched medium then produces a second generation of
stars which are themselves helium-enriched. We use a direct N-body approach to
perform five simulations and conclude that such two-generation clusters are
both possible and would not differ significantly from their single-generation
counterparts on the basis of dynamics. We find, however, that the stellar
populations of such clusters would differ from single-generation clusters with
a standard initial mass function and in particular would be enhanced in white
dwarf stars. We conclude, at least from the standpoint of dynamics, that
two-generation globular clusters are feasible.Comment: 24 pages, 7 figures, 3 tables. Accepted for publication in Ap
Structure of Dark Matter Halos From Hierarchical Clustering
We investigate the structure of the dark matter halo formed in the cold dark
matter scenario using -body simulations. We simulated 12 halos with the mass
of to . In almost all
runs, the halos have density cusps proportional to developed at the
center, which is consistent with the results of recent high-resolution
calculations. The density structure evolves in a self-similar way, and is
universal in the sense that it is independent of the halo mass and initial
random realization of density fluctuation. The density profile is in good
agreement with the profile proposed by Moore et al. (1999), which has central
slope proportional to and outer slope proportional to . The
halo grows through repeated accretion of diffuse smaller halos. We argue that
the cusp is understood as a convergence slope for the accretion of tidally
disrupted matter.Comment: 34 including 23 figures, revised version, accepted for publication in
Ap
Evaporation of Compact Young Clusters near the Galactic Center
We investigate the dynamical evolution of compact young clusters (CYCs) near
the Galactic center (GC) using Fokker-Planck models. CYCs are very young (< 5
Myr), compact (< 1 pc), and only a few tens of pc away from the GC, while they
appear to be as massive as the smallest Galactic globular clusters (~10^4
Msun). A survey of cluster lifetimes for various initial mass functions,
cluster masses, and galactocentric radii is presented. Short relaxation times
due to the compactness of CYCs, and the strong tidal fields near the GC make
clusters evaporate fairly quickly. Depending on cluster parameters, mass
segregation may occur on a time scale shorter than the lifetimes of most
massive stars, which accelerates the cluster's dynamical evolution even more.
When the difference between the upper and lower mass boundaries of the initial
mass function is large enough, strongly selective ejection of lighter stars
makes massive stars dominate even in the outer regions of the cluster, so the
dynamical evolution of those clusters is weakly dependent on the lower mass
boundary. The mass bins for Fokker-Planck simulations were carefully chosen to
properly account for a relatively small number of the most massive stars. We
find that clusters with a mass <~ 2x10^4 Msun evaporate in <~ 10 Myr. A simple
calculation based on the total masses in observed CYCs and the lifetimes
obtained here indicates that the massive CYCs comprise only a fraction of the
star formation rate (SFR) in the inner bulge estimated from Lyman continuum
photons and far-IR observations.Comment: 20 pages in two-column format, accepted for publication in Ap
Modeling the dynamical evolution of the M87 globular cluster system
We study the dynamical evolution of the M87 globular cluster system (GCS)
with a number of numerical simulations. We explore a range of different initial
conditions for the GCS mass function (GCMF), for the GCS spatial distribution
and for the GCS velocity distribution. We confirm that an initial power-law
GCMF like that observed in young cluster systems can be readily transformed
through dynamical processes into a bell-shaped GCMF. However,only models with
initial velocity distributions characterized by a strong radial anisotropy
increasing with the galactocentric distance are able to reproduce the observed
constancy of the GCMF at all radii.We show that such strongly radial orbital
distributions are inconsistent with the observed kinematics of the M87 GCS. The
evolution of models with a bell-shaped GCMF with a turnover similar to that
currently observed in old GCS is also investigated. We show that models with
this initial GCMF can satisfy all the observational constraints currently
available on the GCS spatial distribution,the GCS velocity distribution and on
the GCMF properties.In particular these models successfully reproduce both the
lack of a radial gradient of the GCS mean mass recently found in an analysis of
HST images of M87 at multiple locations, and the observed kinematics of the M87
GCS.Our simulations also show that evolutionary processes significantly affect
the initial GCS properties by leading to the disruption of many clusters and
changing the masses of those which survive.The preferential disruption of inner
clusters flattens the initial GCS number density profile and it can explain the
rising specific frequency with radius; we show that the inner flattening
observed in the M87 GCS spatial distribution can be the result of the effects
of dynamical evolution on an initially steep density profile. (abridged)Comment: 15 pages,14 figures;accepted for publication in The Astrophysical
Journa
Monte Carlo Simulations of Globular Cluster Evolution - II. Mass Spectra, Stellar Evolution and Lifetimes in the Galaxy
We study the dynamical evolution of globular clusters using our new 2-D Monte
Carlo code, and we calculate the lifetimes of clusters in the Galactic
environment. We include the effects of a mass spectrum, mass loss in the
Galactic tidal field, and stellar evolution. We consider initial King models
containing N = 10^5 - 3x10^5 stars, and follow the evolution up to core
collapse, or disruption, whichever occurs first. We find that the lifetimes of
our models are significantly longer than those obtained using 1-D Fokker-Planck
(F-P) methods. We also find that our results are in very good agreement with
recent 2-D F-P calculations, for a wide range of initial conditions. Our
results show that the direct mass loss due to stellar evolution can
significantly accelerate the mass loss through the tidal boundary, causing most
clusters with a low initial central concentration (Wo <~ 3) to disrupt quickly
in the Galactic tidal field. Only clusters born with high initial central
concentrations (Wo >~ 7) or steep initial mass functions are likely to survive
to the present and undergo core collapse. We also study the orbital
characteristics of escaping stars, and find that the velocity distribution of
escaping stars in collapsing clusters looks significantly different from the
distribution in disrupting clusters. We calculate the lifetime of a cluster on
an eccentric orbit in the Galaxy, such that it fills its Roche lobe only at
perigalacticon. We find that such an orbit can extend the lifetime by at most a
factor of a few compared to a circular orbit in which the cluster fills its
Roche lobe at all times.Comment: 32 pages, including 10 figures, to appear in ApJ, minor corrections
onl
Star cluster dynamics
Dynamical evolution plays a key role in shaping the current properties of
star clusters and star cluster systems. A detailed understanding of the effects
of evolutionary processes is essential to be able to disentangle the properties
which result from dynamical evolution from those imprinted at the time of
cluster formation. In this review, we focus our attention on globular clusters
and review the main physical ingredients driving their early and long-term
evolution, describe the possible evolutionary routes and show how cluster
structure and stellar content are affected by dynamical evolution.Comment: 20 pages, 2 figures. To appear as invited review article in a special
issue of the Phil. Trans. Royal Soc. A: Ch. 7 "Star clusters as tracers of
galactic star-formation histories" (ed. R. de Grijs). Fully peer reviewed.
LaTeX, requires rspublic.cls style fil
Ejection of Supermassive Black Holes from Galaxy Cores
[Abridged] Recent numerical relativity simulations have shown that the
emission of gravitational waves during the merger of two supermassive black
holes (SMBHs) delivers a kick to the final hole, with a magnitude as large as
4000 km/s. We study the motion of SMBHs ejected from galaxy cores by such kicks
and the effects on the stellar distribution using high-accuracy direct N-body
simulations. Following the kick, the motion of the SMBH exhibits three distinct
phases. (1) The SMBH oscillates with decreasing amplitude, losing energy via
dynamical friction each time it passes through the core. Chandrasekhar's theory
accurately reproduces the motion of the SMBH in this regime if 2 < ln Lambda <
3 and if the changing core density is taken into account. (2) When the
amplitude of the motion has fallen to roughly the core radius, the SMBH and
core begin to exhibit oscillations about their common center of mass. These
oscillations decay with a time constant that is at least 10 times longer than
would be predicted by naive application of the dynamical friction formula. (3)
Eventually, the SMBH reaches thermal equilibrium with the stars. We estimate
the time for the SMBH's oscillations to damp to the Brownian level in real
galaxies and infer times as long as 1 Gyr in the brightest galaxies. Ejection
of SMBHs also results in a lowered density of stars near the galaxy center;
mass deficits as large as five times the SMBH mass are produced for kick
velocities near the escape velocity. We compare the N-body density profiles
with luminosity profiles of early-type galaxies in Virgo and show that even the
largest observed cores can be reproduced by the kicks, without the need to
postulate hypermassive binary SMBHs. Implications for displaced AGNs and
helical radio structures are discussed.Comment: 18 pages, The Astrophysical Journal, in press. Replaced with revised
versio
The radial structure of galaxy groups and clusters
Simple self-consistent models of galaxy groups and clusters are tested
against the results of high-resolution adiabatic gasdynamical simulations. We
investigate two models based on the existence of a 'universal' dark matter
density profile and two versions of the beta-model. The mass distribution of
relaxed clusters can be fitted by phenomenological formulae proposed in the
literature. Haloes that have experienced a recent merging event are
systematically less concentrated and show steeper profiles than relaxed objects
near the centre. The hot X-ray emitting gas is found to be in approximate
hydrostatic equilibrium with the dark matter potential, and it is well
described by a polytropic equation of state. Analytic formulae for the gas
density and temperature can be derived from these premises. Though able to
reproduce the X-ray surface brightness, the beta-model is shown to provide a
poor description of our numerical clusters. We find strong evidence of a
'universal' temperature profile that decreases by a factor of 2-3 from the
centre to the virial radius, whereas baryon fraction and entropy are
monotonically increasing functions. Numerical resolution and entropy
conservation play a key role in the shapes of the profiles at small radii.Comment: 16 pages, 19 figures, minor changes to match published versio
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