arXiv subjects

Nicolas F. Martin

Publications and source records attributed to Nicolas F. Martin.

At least 91 records · Page 5Linked to original sources

arXiv2018

A-type stars in the Canada-France Imaging Survey II. Tracing the height of the disc at large distances with Blue Stragglers

We present the kinematics of Blue Straggler (BS) stars identified in the Canada-France-Imaging-Survey (CFIS), covering 4000 deg$^2$ on the sky in the $u$-band. The BS sample, characterised through CFIS and Pan-STARRS photometry, has been kinematically decomposed into putative halo and disc populations after cross-matching with Gaia astrometry and SDSS/SEGUE/LAMOST spectroscopy. This decomposition clearly reveals the strong flaring of the outer Milky Way disc. In particular, we show that we can detect this flaring up to a vertical height of $|Z| \simeq 8$ kpc at a Galactocentric distance of $R\sim $27 kpc. While some small level of flaring is expected for extended discs built up by radial migration, we demonstrate that this observed very strong flaring of the Milky Way disc is more likely consistent with it being dynamically heated by the repeated passage of the Sagittarius dwarf spheroidal galaxy through the midplane.

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arXiv2018

Phlegethon, a nearby $75°$-long retrograde stellar stream

We report the discovery of a $75°$ long stellar stream in Gaia DR2 catalog, found using the new STREAMFINDER algorithm. The structure is probably the remnant of a now fully disrupted globular cluster, lies $\approx 3.8 \, {\rm kpc}$ away from the Sun in the direction of the Galactic bulge, and possesses highly retrograde motion. We find that the system orbits close to the Galactic plane at Galactocentric distances between $4.9$ and $19.8 \, {\rm kpc}$. The discovery of this extended and extremely low surface brightness stream ($Σ_G\sim 34.3 \, {\rm mag \, arcsec^{-2}}$) with a mass of only $2580\pm140 \, {\rm\,M_\odot}$, demonstrates the power of the STREAMFINDER algorithm to detect even very nearby and ultra-faint structures. Due to its proximity and length we expect that Phlegethon will be a very useful probe of the Galactic acceleration field.

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arXiv2018

Ghostly Tributaries to the Milky Way: Charting the Halo's Stellar Streams with the Gaia DR2 catalogue

We present a panoramic map of the stellar streams of the Milky Way based upon astrometric and photometric measurements from the Gaia DR2 catalogue. In this first contribution, we concentrate on the halo at heliocentric distances beyond 5 kpc, and at Galactic latitudes $|b|>30°$, using the STREAMFINDER algorithm to detect structures along plausible orbits that are consistent with the Gaia proper motion measurements. We find a rich network of criss-crossing streams in the halo. Some of these structures were previously-known, several are new discoveries, but others are potentially artefacts of the Gaia scanning law and will require confirmation. With these initial discoveries, we are starting to unravel the complex formation of the halo of our Galaxy.

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arXiv2018

STREAMFINDER II: A possible fanning structure parallel to the GD-1 stream in Pan-STARRS1

STREAMFINDER is a new algorithm that we have built to detect stellar streams in an automated and systematic way in astrophysical datasets that possess any combination of positional and kinematic information. In Paper I, we introduced the methodology and the workings of our algorithm and showed that it is capable of detecting ultra-faint and distant halo stream structures containing as few as $\sim 15$ members ($Σ_{\rm G} \sim 33.6\, {\rm mag \, arcsec^{-2}}$) in the Gaia dataset. Here, we test the method with real proper motion data from the Pan-STARRS1 survey, and by selecting targets down to $r_{0}=18.5$ mag we show that it is able to detect the GD-1 stellar stream, whereas the structure remains below a useful detection limit when using a Matched Filter technique. The radial velocity solutions provided by STREAMFINDER for GD-1 candidate members are found to be in good agreement with observations. Furthermore, our algorithm detects a $\sim 40^°$ long structure approximately parallel to GD-1, and which fans out from it, possibly a sign of stream-fanning due to the triaxiality of the Galactic potential. This analysis shows the promise of this method for detecting and analysing stellar streams in the upcoming Gaia DR2 catalogue.

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arXiv2018

Current velocity data on dwarf galaxy NGC1052-DF2 do not constrain it to lack dark matter

It was recently proposed that the globular cluster system of the very low surface-brightness galaxy NGC1052-DF2 is dynamically very cold, leading to the conclusion that this dwarf galaxy has little or no dark matter. Here, we show that a robust statistical measure of the velocity dispersion of the tracer globular clusters implies a mundane velocity dispersion and a poorly constrained mass-to-light ratio. Models that include the possibility that some of the tracers are field contaminants do not yield a more constraining inference. We derive only a weak constraint on the mass-to-light ratio of the system within the half-light radius (M/L_V<6.7 at the 90% confidence level) or within the radius of the furthest tracer (M/L_V<8.1 at the 90% confidence level). This limit may imply a mass-to-light ratio on the low end for a dwarf galaxy but many Local Group dwarf galaxies fall well within this contraint. With this study, we emphasize the need to reliably account for measurement uncertainties and to stay as close as possible to the data when determining dynamical masses from very small data sets of tracers.

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arXiv2018

Exploring the Very Extended Low Surface Brightness Stellar Populations of the Large Magellanic Cloud with SMASH

We present the detection of very extended stellar populations around the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) out to R~21 degrees, or ~18.5 kpc at the LMC distance of 50 kpc, as detected in the Survey of the MAgellanic Stellar History (SMASH) performed with the Dark Energy Camera on the NOAO Blanco 4m Telescope. The deep (g~24) SMASH color magnitude diagrams (CMDs) clearly reveal old (~9 Gyr), metal-poor ([Fe/H]=-0.8 dex) main-sequence stars at a distance of 50 kpc. The surface brightness of these detections is extremely low with our most distant detection having 34 mag per arcsec squared in g-band. The SMASH radial density profile breaks from the inner LMC exponential decline at ~13-15 degrees and a second component at larger radii has a shallower slope with power-law index of -2.2 that contributes ~0.4% of the LMC's total stellar mass. In addition, the SMASH densities exhibit large scatter around our best-fit model of ~70% indicating that the envelope of stellar material in the LMC periphery is highly disturbed. We also use data from the NOAO Source catalog to map the LMC main-sequence populations at intermediate radii and detect a steep dropoff in density on the eastern side of the LMC (at R~8 deg) as well as an extended structure to the far northeast. These combined results confirm the existence of a very extended, low-density envelope of stellar material with disturbed shape around the LMC. The exact origin of this structure remains unclear but the leading options include a classical accreted halo or tidally stripped outer disk material.

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arXiv2018

The Profile of the Galactic Halo from Pan-STARRS1 3$π$ RR Lyrae

We characterize the spatial density of the Pan-STARRS1 (PS1) sample of RR Lyrae stars, to study the properties of the old Galactic stellar halo as traced by RRab stars. This sample of 44,403 sources spans Galactocentric radii of $0.55 \; \mathrm{kpc} \leq R_{\mathrm{gc}} \leq 141 \; \mathrm{kpc}$ with a distance precision of 3\% and thus is able to trace the halo out to larger distances than most previous studies. After excising stars that are attributed to dense regions such as stellar streams, the Galactic disc and bulge as well as halo globular clusters, the sample contains ${\sim}11,000$ sources within $20 \; \mathrm{kpc} \leq R_{\mathrm{gc}} \leq 131 \; \mathrm{kpc}$. We then apply forward modeling using ellipsoidal stellar density models $ρ(l,b,R_{\mathrm{gc}})$ both with a constant and a radius-dependent halo flattening $q(R_{\mathrm{gc}})$. Assuming constant flattening $q$, the distribution of the sources is reasonably well fit from $20 \; \mathrm{kpc}$ to $131 \; \mathrm{kpc}$ by a single power law with $n=4.40^{+0.05}_{-0.04}$ and $q=0.918^{+0.016}_{-0.014}$. The distance distribution is fit comparably well by an Einasto profile with $n=9.53^{+0.27}_{-0.28}$, an effective radius $r_{\mathrm{eff}}=1.07 \pm 0.10 \; \mathrm{kpc}$ and a halo flattening of $q=0.923 \pm 0.007$. If we allow for a radius-dependent flattening $q(R_{\mathrm{gc}})$, we find evidence for a distinct flattening of $q{\sim}0.8$ of the inner halo at ${\sim} 25 \; \mathrm{kpc}$. Additionally, we find that the south Galactic hemisphere is more flattened than the north Galactic hemisphere. The results of our work are largely consistent with many earlier results, e.g. \cite{Watkins2009}, \cite{Iorio2017}. We find that the stellar halo, as traced in RR Lyrae stars, exhibits a substantial number of further significant over- and underdensities, even after all known overdensities have been masked.

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arXiv2017

The ISLAnds Project III: Variable Stars in Six Andromeda Dwarf Spheroidal Galaxies

We present a census of variable stars in six M31 dwarf spheroidal satellites observed with the Hubble Space Telescope. We detect 870 RR Lyrae (RRL) stars in the fields of And I (296), II (251), III (111), XV (117), XVI (8), XXVIII (87). We also detect a total of 15 Anomalous Cepheids, three Eclipsing Binaries, and seven field RRL stars compatible with being members of the M31 halo or the Giant Stellar Stream. We derive robust and homogeneous distances to the six galaxies using different methods based on the properties of the RRL stars. Working with the up-to-date set of Period-Wesenheit ($I$, $B$ - $I$) relations published by Marconi et al., we obtain distance moduli of $μ_0$ = [24.49, 24.16, 24.36, 24.42, 23.70, 24.43] mag (respectively), with systematic uncertainties of 0.08 mag and statistical uncertainties $<$ 0.11 mag. We have considered an enlarged sample of sixteen M31 satellites with published variability studies, and compared their pulsational observables (e.g., periods, amplitudes), with those of fifteen Milky Way satellites for which similar data are available. The properties of the (strictly old) RRL in both satellite systems do not show any significant difference. In particular, we found a strikingly similar correlation between the mean period distribution of the fundamental RRL pulsators (RRab) and the mean metallicities of the galaxies. This indicates that the old RRL progenitors were similar at the early stage in the two environments, suggesting very similar characteristics for the earliest stages of evolution of both satellite systems.

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arXiv2017

The Geometry of Sagittarius Stream from Pan-STARRS1 3$π$ RR Lyrae

We present a comprehensive and precise description of the Sagittarius (Sgr) stellar stream's 3D geometry as traced by its old stellar population. This analysis draws on the sample of ${\sim}44,000$ RR Lyrae (RRab) stars from the Pan-STARRS1 (PS1) 3$π$ survey (Hernitschek et al. 2016,Sesar et al. 2017b), which is ${\sim}80\%$ complete and ${\sim}90\%$ pure within 80~kpc, and extends to ${\gtrsim} 120$~kpc with a distance precision of ${\sim} 3\%$. A projection of RR Lyrae stars within $|\tilde{B}|_{\odot}<9^\circ$ of the Sgr stream's orbital plane reveals the morphology of both the leading and the trailing arms at very high contrast, across much of the sky. In particular, the map traces the stream near-contiguously through the distant apocenters. We fit a simple model for the mean distance and line-of-sight depth of the Sgr stream as a function of the orbital plane angle $\tildeΛ_{\odot}$, along with a power-law background-model for the field stars. This modeling results in estimates of the mean stream distance precise to ${\sim}1\%$ and it resolves the stream's line-of-sight depth. These improved geometric constraints can serve as new constraints for dynamical stream models.

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arXiv2017

A rogues gallery of Andromeda's dwarf galaxies I. A predominance of red horizontal branches

We present homogeneous, sub-horizontal branch photometry of twenty dwarf spheroidal satellite galaxies of M31 observed with the Hubble Space Telescope. Combining our new data for sixteen systems with archival data in the same filters for another four, we show that Andromeda dwarf spheroidal galaxies favor strikingly red horizontal branches or red clumps down to ~10^{4.2} Lsun (M_V ~ -5.8). The age-sensitivity of horizontal branch stars implies that a large fraction of the M31 dwarf galaxies have extended star formation histories (SFHs), and appear inconsistent with early star formation episodes that were rapidly shutdown. Systems fainter than ~10^{5.5} Lsun show the widest range in the ratios and morphologies of red and blue horizontal branches, indicative of both complex SFHs and a diversity in quenching timescales and/or mechanisms, which is qualitatively different from what is currently known for faint Milky Way (MW) satellites of comparable luminosities. Our findings bolster similar conclusions from recent deeper data for a handful of M31 dwarf galaxies. We discuss several sources for diversity of our data such as varying halo masses, patchy reionization, mergers/accretion, and the environmental influence of M31 and the Milky Way on the early evolution of their satellite populations. A detailed comparison between the histories of M31 and MW satellites would shed signifiant insight into the processes that drive the evolution of low-mass galaxies. Such a study will require imaging that reaches the oldest main sequence turnoffs for a significant number of M31 companions.

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arXiv2017

SMASH 1: a very faint globular cluster disrupting in the outer reaches of the LMC?

We present the discovery of a very faint stellar system, SMASH 1, that is potentially a satellite of the Large Magellanic Cloud. Found within the Survey of the MAgellanic Stellar History (SMASH), SMASH 1 is a compact ($r_h = 9.1^{+5.9}_{-3.4}$ pc) and very low luminosity (M_V = -1.0 +/- 0.9, $L_V=10^{2.3 +/- 0.4}$ Lsun) stellar system that is revealed by its sparsely populated main sequence and a handful of red-giant-branch candidate member stars. The photometric properties of these stars are compatible with a metal-poor ([Fe/H]=-2.2) and old (13 Gyr) isochrone located at a distance modulus of ~18.8, i.e. a distance of ~57 kpc. Situated at 11.3$^\circ$ from the LMC in projection, its 3-dimensional distance from the Cloud is ~13 kpc, consistent with a connection to the LMC, whose tidal radius is at least 16 kpc. Although the nature of SMASH 1 remains uncertain, its compactness favors it being a stellar cluster and hence dark-matter free. If this is the case, its dynamical tidal radius is only <19 pc at this distance from the LMC, and smaller than the system's extent on the sky. Its low luminosity and apparent high ellipticity ($ε=0.62^{+0.17}_{-0.21}$) with its major axis pointing toward the LMC may well be the tell-tale sign of its imminent tidal demise.

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arXiv2017

A Gaia-PS1-SDSS (GPS1) Proper Motion Catalog Covering 3/4 of the Sky

We combine Gaia DR1, PS1, SDSS and 2MASS astrometry to measure proper motions for 350 million sources across three-fourths of the sky down to a magnitude of $m_r\sim20$\,. Using positions of galaxies from PS1, we build a common reference frame for the multi-epoch PS1, single-epoch SDSS and 2MASS data, and calibrate the data in small angular patches to this frame. As the Gaia DR1 excludes resolved galaxy images, we choose a different approach to calibrate its positions to this reference frame: we exploit the fact that the proper motions of stars in these patches are {\it linear}. By simultaneously fitting the positions of stars at different epochs of -- Gaia DR1, PS1, SDSS, and 2MASS -- we construct an extensive catalog of proper motions dubbed GPS1. GPS1 has a characteristic systematic error of less than 0.3 \masyr\, and a typical precision of $ 1.5-2.0$\masyr. The proper motions have been validated using galaxies, open clusters, distant giant stars and QSOs. In comparison with other published faint proper motion catalogs, GPS1's systematic error ($<0.3$ \masyr) should be nearly an order of magnitude better than that of PPMXL and UCAC4 ($>2.0$ \masyr). Similarly, its precision ($\sim 1.5$ \masyr) is a four-fold improvement relative to PPMXL and UCAC4 ($\sim 6.0$ \masyr). For QSOs, the precision of GPS1 is found to be worse ($\sim 2.0-3.0$\masyr), possibly due to their particular differential chromatic refraction (DCR). The GPS1 catalog will be released on-line and available via the VizieR Service and VO Service. (===GPS1 is available with VO TAP Query now, see http://www2.mpia-hd.mpg.de/~tian/GPS1/ for details=== )

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arXiv2017

SMASH - Survey of the MAgellanic Stellar History

The Large and Small Magellanic Clouds (LMC and SMC) are unique local laboratories for studying the formation and evolution of small galaxies in exquisite detail. The Survey of the MAgellanic Stellar History (SMASH) is an NOAO community DECam survey of the Clouds mapping 480 square degrees (distributed over ~2400 square degrees at ~20% filling factor) to ~24th mag in ugriz with the goal of identifying broadly distributed, low surface brightness stellar populations associated with the stellar halos and tidal debris of the Clouds. SMASH will also derive spatially-resolved star formation histories covering all ages out to large radii from the MCs that will further complement our understanding of their formation. Here, we present a summary of the survey, its data reduction, and a description of the first public Data Release (DR1). The SMASH DECam data have been reduced with a combination of the NOAO Community Pipeline, PHOTRED, an automated PSF photometry pipeline based mainly on the DAOPHOT suite, and custom calibration software. The attained astrometric precision is ~15 mas and the accuracy is ~2 mas with respect to the Gaia DR1 astrometric reference frame. The photometric precision is ~0.5-0.7% in griz and ~1% in u with a calibration accuracy of ~1.3% in all bands. The median 5 sigma point source depths in ugriz bands are 23.9, 24.8, 24.5, 24.2, 23.5 mag. The SMASH data already have been used to discover the Hydra II Milky Way satellite, the SMASH 1 old globular cluster likely associated with the LMC, and very extended stellar populations around the LMC out to R~18.4 kpc. SMASH DR1 contains measurements of ~100 million objects distributed in 61 fields. A prototype version of the NOAO Data Lab provides data access, including a data discovery tool, SMASH database access, an image cutout service, and a Jupyter notebook server with example notebooks for exploratory analysis.

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arXiv2017

Stellar streams as gravitational experiments II. Asymmetric tails of globular cluster streams

Kinematically cold tidal streams of globular clusters (GC) are excellent tracers of the Galactic gravitational potential at moderate Galactocentric distances, and can also be used as probes of the law of gravity on Galactic scales. Here, we compare for the first time the generation of such streams in Newtonian and Milgromian gravity (MOND). We first compute analytical results to investigate the expected shape of the GC gravitational potential in both frameworks, and we then run N-body simulations with the Phantom of Ramses code. We find that the GCs tend to become lopsided in MOND. This is a consequence of the external field effect which breaks the strong equivalence principle. When the GC is filling its tidal radius the lopsidedness generates a strongly asymmetric tidal stream. In Newtonian dynamics, such markedly asymmetric streams can in general only be the consequence of interactions with dark matter subhalos, giant molecular clouds, or interaction with the Galactic bar. In these Newtonian cases, the asymmetry is the consequence of a very large gap in the stream, whilst in MOND it is a true asymmetry. This should thus allow us in the future to distinguish these different scenarios by making deep observations of the environment of the asymmetric stellar stream of Palomar 5. Moreover, our simulations indicate that the high internal velocity dispersion of Palomar 5 for its small stellar mass would be natural in MOND.

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arXiv2017

Feeling the pull, a study of natural Galactic accelerometers. II: kinematics and mass of the delicate stellar stream of the Palomar 5 globular cluster

We present two spectroscopic surveys of the tidal stellar stream of the Palomar 5 globular cluster, undertaken with the VLT/FLAMES and AAT/AAOmega instruments. We use these data in conjunction with photometric data presented in the previous contribution in this series to classify the survey stars in terms of their probability of belonging to the Palomar 5 stellar stream. We find that high-probability candidates are only found in a very narrow spatial interval surrounding the locus of the stream on the sky. PanSTARRS RRLyrae stars in this region of sky are also distributed in a similar manner. The absence of significant "fanning" of this stellar stream confirms that Palomar 5 does not follow a chaotic orbit. Previous studies have found that Palomar 5 is largely devoid of low-mass stars, and we show that this is true also of the stellar populations along the trailing arm out to $6°$. Within this region, which contains 73\% of the detected stars, the population is statistically identical to the core, implying that the ejection of the low-mass stars occurred before the formation of the stream. We also present an updated structural model fit to the bound remnant, which yields a total mass of $4297\pm98 {\rm\,M_\odot}$ and a tidal radius $0.145\pm0.009$ kpc. We estimate the mass of the observed system including the stream to be $12200\pm400 {\rm\,M_\odot}$, and the initial mass to have been $\sim47000\pm1500 {\rm\,M_\odot}$. These observational constraints will be employed in our next study to model the dynamics of the system in detail.

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arXiv2017

The Canada-France Imaging Survey: First results from the u-band component

The Canada-France Imaging Survey (CFIS) will map the northern high Galactic latitude sky in the $u$-band ("CFIS-u", 10,000$\, {\rm deg^2}$) and in the $r$-band ("CFIS-r", 5,000$\, {\rm deg^2}$), enabling a host of stand-alone science investigations, and providing some of the ground-based data necessary for photometric redshift determination for the Euclid mission. In this first contribution we present the $u$-band component of the survey, describe the observational strategy, and discuss some first highlight results, based on approximately one third of the final area. We show that the Galactic anticenter structure is distributed continuously along the line of sight, out to beyond 20 kpc, and possesses a metallicity distribution that is essentially identical to that of the outer disk sampled by APOGEE. This suggests that it is probably a buckled disk of old metal-rich stars, rather than a stream or a flare. We also discuss the future potential for CFIS-u in discovering star-forming dwarf galaxies around the Local Group, the characterization of the white dwarf and blue straggler population of the Milky Way, as well as its sensitivity to low-surface brightness structures in external galaxies.

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arXiv2017

Chemical Mapping of the Milky Way With The Canada-France Imaging Survey: A Non-parametric Metallicity-Distance Decomposition of the Galaxy

We present the chemical distribution of the Milky Way, based on 2,900$\, {\rm deg^2}$ of $u$-band photometry taken as part of the Canada-France Imaging Survey. When complete, this survey will cover 10,000$\, {\rm deg^2}$ of the Northern sky. By combing the CFHT $u$-band photometry together with SDSS and Pan-STARRS $g,r,$ and $i$, we demonstrate that we are able to measure reliably the metallicities of individual stars to $\sim 0.2$ dex, and hence additionally obtain good photometric distance estimates. This survey thus permits the measurement of metallicities and distances of the dominant main-sequence population out to approximately 30 kpc, and provides much higher number of stars at large extraplanar distances than have been available from previous surveys. We develop a non-parametric distance-metallicity decomposition algorithm and apply it to the sky at $30°< |b| < 70°$ and to the North Galactic Cap. We find that the metallicity-distance distribution is well-represented by three populations whose metallicity distributions do not vary significantly with vertical height above the disk. As traced in main-sequence stars, the stellar halo component shows a vertical density profile that is close to exponential, with a scale height of around 3 kpc. This may indicate that the inner halo was formed partly from disk stars ejected in an ancient minor merger.

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arXiv2017

Machine-Learned Identification of RR Lyrae Stars from Sparse, Multi-band Data: the PS1 Sample

RR Lyrae stars may be the best practical tracers of Galactic halo (sub-)structure and kinematics. The PanSTARRS1 (PS1) $3π$ survey offers multi-band, multi-epoch, precise photometry across much of the sky, but a robust identification of RR Lyrae stars in this data set poses a challenge, given PS1's sparse, asynchronous multi-band light curves ($\lesssim 12$ epochs in each of five bands, taken over a 4.5-year period). We present a novel template fitting technique that uses well-defined and physically motivated multi-band light curves of RR Lyrae stars, and demonstrate that we get accurate period estimates, precise to 2~sec in $>80\%$ of cases. We augment these light curve fits with other {\em features} from photometric time-series and provide them to progressively more detailed machine-learned classification models. From these models we are able to select the widest ($3/4$ of the sky) and deepest (reaching 120 kpc) sample of RR Lyrae stars to date. The PS1 sample of $\sim 45,000$ RRab stars is pure (90\%), and complete (80\% at 80 kpc) at high galactic latitudes. It also provides distances precise to 3\%, measured with newly derived period-luminosity relations for optical/near-infrared PS1 bands. With the addition of proper motions from {\em Gaia} and radial velocity measurements from multi-object spectroscopic surveys, we expect the PS1 sample of RR Lyrae stars to become the premier source for studying the structure, kinematics, and the gravitational potential of the Galactic halo. The techniques presented in this study should translate well to other sparse, multi-band data sets, such as those produced by the Dark Energy Survey and the upcoming Large Synoptic Survey Telescope Galactic plane sub-survey.

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