arXiv subjects

Stelios Kazantzidis

Publications and source records attributed to Stelios Kazantzidis.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2010

The Sphericalization of Dark Matter Halos by Galaxy Disks

Cosmological simulations indicate that cold dark matter (CDM) halos should be triaxial. Verifying observationally this theoretical prediction is, however, less than straightforward because the assembly of galaxies is expected to modify the halo shapes and to render them more axisymmetric. We use a suite of N-body simulations to investigate quantitatively the effect of the growth of a central disk galaxy on the shape of triaxial dark matter halos. As expected, the halo responds to the presence of the disk by becoming more spherical. The net effect depends only weakly on the orientation of the disk relative to the halo principal axes or the timescale of disk assembly, but strongly on the overall gravitational importance of the disk. Our results show that exponential disks whose contribution peaks at less than ~50% of their circular velocity are unable to modify noticeably the shape of the gravitational potential of their surrounding halos. Many dwarf and low surface brightness galaxies are expected to be in this regime, and therefore their detailed kinematics could be used to probe halo triaxiality, one of the basic predictions of the CDM paradigm. We argue that the complex disk kinematics of the dwarf galaxy NGC 2976 might be the reflection of a triaxial halo. Such signatures of halo triaxiality should be common in galaxies where the luminous component is subdominant.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2010

Thick-disk evolution induced by the growth of an embedded thin disk

We perform collisionless N-body simulations to investigate the evolution of the structural and kinematical properties of simulated thick disks induced by the growth of an embedded thin disk. The thick disks used in the present study originate from cosmologically-common 5:1 encounters between initially-thin primary disk galaxies and infalling satellites. The growing thin disks are modeled as static gravitational potentials and we explore a variety of growing-disk parameters that are likely to influence the response of thick disks. We find that the final thick-disk properties depend strongly on the total mass and radial scale-length of the growing thin disk, and much less sensitively on its growth timescale and vertical scale-height as well as the initial sense of thick-disk rotation. Overall, the growth of an embedded thin disk can cause a substantial contraction in both the radial and vertical direction, resulting in a significant decrease in the scale-lengths and scale-heights of thick disks. Kinematically, a growing thin disk can induce a notable increase in the mean rotation and velocity dispersions of thick-disk stars. We conclude that the reformation of a thin disk via gas accretion may play a significant role in setting the structure and kinematics of thick disks, and thus it is an important ingredient in models of thick-disk formation.

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arXiv2010

Biases in mass estimates of dSph galaxies

Using a high resolution N-body simulation of a two-component dwarf galaxy orbiting in the potential of the Milky Way, we study two effects that lead to significant biases in mass estimates of dwarf spheroidal galaxies. Both are due to the strong tidal interaction of initially disky dwarfs with their host. The tidal stripping of dwarf stars leads to the formation of strong tidal tails that are typically aligned with the line of sight of an observer positioned close to the host center. The stars from the tails contaminate the kinematic samples leading to a velocity dispersion profile increasing with the projected radius and resulting in an overestimate of mass. The tidal stirring of the dwarf leads to the morphological transformation of the initial stellar disk into a bar and then a spheroid. The distribution of stars in the dwarf remains non-spherical for a long time leading to an overestimate of its mass if it is observed along the major axis and an underestimate if it seen in the perpendicular direction.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2010

Heated Disc Stars in the Stellar Halo

Minor accretion events with mass ratio M_sat : M_host ~ 1:10 are common in the context of LCDM cosmology. We use high-resolution simulations of Galaxy-analogue systems to show that these mergers can dynamically eject disk stars into a diffuse light component that resembles a stellar halo both spatially and kinematically. For a variety of orbital configurations, we find that ~3-5e8 M_sun of primary stellar disk material is ejected to a distance larger than 5 kpc above the galactic plane. This ejected contribution is similar to the mass contributed by the tidal disruption of the satellite galaxy itself, though it is less extended. If we restrict our analysis to the approximate solar neighborhood in the disk plane, we find that ~1% of the initial disk stars in that region would be classified kinematically as halo stars. Our results suggest that the inner parts of galactic stellar halos contain ancient disk stars and that these stars may have been liberated in the very same events that delivered material to the outer stellar halo.

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arXiv2009

Direct Formation of Supermassive Black Holes via Multi-Scale Gas Inflows in Galaxy Mergers

Observations of distant bright quasars suggest that billion solar mass supermassive black holes (SMBHs) were already in place less than a billion years after the Big Bang. Models in which light black hole seeds form by the collapse of primordial metal-free stars cannot explain their rapid appearance due to inefficient gas accretion. Alternatively, these black holes may form by direct collapse of gas at the center of protogalaxies. However, this requires metal-free gas that does not cool efficiently and thus is not turned into stars, in contrast with the rapid metal enrichment of protogalaxies. Here we use a numerical simulation to show that mergers between massive protogalaxies naturally produce the required central gas accumulation with no need to suppress star formation. Merger-driven gas inflows produce an unstable, massive nuclear gas disk. Within the disk a second gas inflow accumulates more than 100 million solar masses of gas in a sub-parsec scale cloud in one hundred thousand years. The cloud undergoes gravitational collapse, which eventually leads to the formation of a massive black hole. The black hole can grow to a billion solar masses in less than a billion years by accreting gas from the surrounding disk.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2009

The stellar structure and kinematics of dwarf spheroidal galaxies formed by tidal stirring

Using high-resolution N-body simulations we study the stellar properties of dwarf spheroidal galaxies resulting from the tidally induced morphological transformation of disky dwarfs on a cosmologically motivated eccentric orbit around the Milky Way. Dwarf galaxy models initially consist of an exponential stellar disk embedded in an extended spherical dark matter halo. Depending on the initial orientation of the disk with respect to the orbital plane, different final configurations are obtained. The least evolved dwarf is triaxial and retains a significant amount of rotation. The more evolved dwarfs are prolate spheroids with little rotation. We show that the final density distribution of stars can be approximated by a simple modification of the Plummer law. The kinematics of the dwarfs is significantly different depending on the line of sight which has important implications for mapping the observed stellar velocity dispersions of dwarfs to subhalo circular velocities. When the dwarfs are observed along the long axis, the measured velocity dispersion is higher and decreases faster with radius. In the case where rotation is significant, when viewed perpendicular to the long axis, the effect of minor axis rotation is detected, as expected for triaxial systems. We model the velocity dispersion profiles and rotation curves of the dwarfs by solving the Jeans equations for spherical and axisymmetric systems and adjusting different sets of free parameters. We find that the mass is typically overestimated when the dwarf is seen along the long axis and underestimated when the observation is along the short or intermediate axis. The effect of non-sphericity cannot however bias the inferred mass by more than 60 percent in either direction, even for the most strongly stripped dwarf which is close to disruption.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2009

The orientation and kinematics of inner tidal tails around dwarf galaxies orbiting the Milky Way

Using high-resolution collisionless N-body simulations we study the properties of tidal tails formed in the immediate vicinity of a two-component dwarf galaxy evolving in a static potential of the Milky Way (MW). The stellar component of the dwarf is initially in the form of a disk and the galaxy is placed on an eccentric orbit motivated by CDM-based cosmological simulations. We measure the orientation, density and velocity distribution of the stars in the tails. Due to the geometry of the orbit, in the vicinity of the dwarf, where the tails are densest and therefore most likely to be detectable, they are typically oriented towards the MW and not along the orbit. We report on an interesting phenomenon of `tidal tail flipping': on the way from the pericentre to the apocentre the old tails following the orbit are dissolved and new ones pointing towards the MW are formed over a short timescale. We also find a tight linear relation between the velocity of stars in the tidal tails and their distance from the dwarf. Using mock data sets we demonstrate that if dwarf spheroidal (dSph) galaxies in the vicinity of the MW are tidally affected their kinematic samples are very likely contaminated by tidally stripped stars which tend to artificially inflate the measured velocity dispersion. The effect is stronger for dwarfs on their way from the peri- to the apocentre due to the formation of new tidal tails after pericentre. Realistic mass estimates of dSph galaxies thus require removal of these stars from kinematic samples.

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arXiv2009

Evolution of the Dark Matter Phase-Space Density Distributions of LCDM Halos

We study the evolution of phase-space density during the hierarchical structure formation of LCDM halos. We compute both a spherically-averaged surrogate for phase-space density (Q) and the coarse-grained distribution function f(x,v) for dark matter particles that lie within~2 virial radii of four Milky-Way-sized dark matter halos. The estimated f(x,v) spans over four decades at any radius. Dark matter particles that end up within two virial radii of a Milky-Way-sized DM halo at $z=0$ have an approximately Gaussian distribution in log(f) at early redshifts, but the distribution becomes increasingly skewed at lower redshifts. The value corresponding to the peak of the Gaussian decreases as the evolution progresses and is well described by a power-law in (1+z). The highest values of f are found at the centers of dark matter halos and subhalos, where f can be an order of magnitude higher than in the center of the main halo. The power-law Q(r) profile likely reflects the distribution of entropy (K = sigma^2/rho^{2/3} \propto r^{1.2}), which dark matter acquires as it is accreted onto a growing halo. The estimated f(x, v), on the other hand, exhibits a more complicated behavior. Although the median coarse-grained phase-space density profile F(r) can be approximated by a power-law in the inner regions of halos and at larger radii the profile flattens significantly. This is because phase-space density averaged on small scales is sensitive to the high-f material associated with surviving subhalos, as well as relatively unmixed material (probably in streams) resulting from disrupted subhalos, which contribute a sizable fraction of matter at large radii. (ABRIDGED)

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arXiv2009

Evolution of Dark Matter Phase-Space Density Distributions in Equal-Mass Halo Mergers

We use dissipationless N-body simulations to investigate the evolution of the true coarse-grained phase-space density distribution f(x,v) in equal-mass mergers between dark matter (DM) halos. The halo models are constructed with various asymptotic power-law indices ranging from steep cusps to core-like profiles and we employ the phase-space density estimator ``Enbid'' developed by Sharma & Steinmetz to compute f(x,v). The adopted force resolution allows robust phase-space density profile estimates in the inner ~1% of the virial radii of the simulated systems. We confirm that mergers result in a decrease of the coarse-grained phase-space density in accordance with expectations from Mixing Theorems for collisionless systems. We demonstrate that binary mergers between identical DM halos produce remnants that retain excellent memories of the inner slopes and overall shapes of the phase-space density distribution of their progenitors. The robustness of the phase-space density profiles holds for a range of orbital energies, and a variety of encounter configurations including sequences of several consecutive merger events, designed to mimic hierarchical merging, and collisions occurring at different cosmological epochs. If the progenitor halos are constructed with appreciably different asymptotic power-law indices, we find that the inner slope and overall shape of the phase-space density distribution of the remnant are substantially closer to that of the initial system with the steepest central density cusp. These results explicitly demonstrate that mixing is incomplete in equal-mass mergers between DM halos, as it does not erase memory of the progenitor properties. Our results also confirm the recent analytical predictions of Dehnen (2005) regarding the preservation of merging self-gravitating central density cusps.

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arXiv2009

Cold Dark Matter Substructure and Galactic Disks II: Dynamical Effects of Hierarchical Satellite Accretion

(Abridged) We perform dissipationless N-body simulations to elucidate the dynamical response of thin disks to bombardment by cold dark matter (CDM) substructure. Our method combines (1) cosmological simulations of the formation of Milky Way (MW)-sized CDM halos to derive the properties of substructure and (2) controlled numerical experiments of consecutive subhalo impacts onto an initially-thin, fully-formed MW type disk galaxy. The present study is the first to account for the evolution of satellite populations over cosmic time in such an investigation of disk structure. We find that accretions of massive subhalos onto the central regions of host halos, where the galactic disks reside, since z~1 should be common. One host halo accretion history is used to initialize the controlled simulations of satellite-disk encounters. We show that these accretion events severely perturb the thin galactic disk and produce a wealth of distinctive dynamical signatures on its structure and kinematics. These include (1) considerable thickening and heating at all radii, with the disk thickness and velocity ellipsoid nearly doubling at the solar radius; (2) prominent flaring associated with an increase in disk thickness greater than a factor of 4 in the disk outskirts; (3) surface density excesses at large radii, beyond ~5 disk scale lengths, resembling those of observed antitruncated disks; (4) lopsidedness at levels similar to those measured in observational samples of disk galaxies; and (5) substantial tilting. The interaction with the most massive subhalo drives the disk response while subsequent bombardment is much less efficient at disturbing the disk. We conclude that substructure-disk encounters of the kind expected in the LCDM paradigm play a significant role in setting the structure of disk galaxies and driving galaxy evolution.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2009

Tidal evolution of disky dwarf galaxies in the Milky Way potential: the formation of dwarf spheroidals

We conduct high-resolution collisionless N-body simulations to investigate the tidal evolution of dwarf galaxies on an eccentric orbit in the Milky Way (MW) potential. The dwarfs originally consist of a low surface brightness stellar disk embedded in a cosmologically motivated dark matter halo. During 10 Gyr of dynamical evolution and after 5 pericentre passages the dwarfs suffer substantial mass loss and their stellar component undergoes a major morphological transformation from a disk to a bar and finally to a spheroid. The bar is preserved for most of the time as the angular momentum is transferred outside the galaxy. A dwarf spheroidal (dSph) galaxy is formed via gradual shortening of the bar. This work thus provides a comprehensive quantitative explanation of a potentially crucial morphological transformation mechanism for dwarf galaxies that operates in groups as well as in clusters. We compare three cases with different initial inclinations of the disk and find that the evolution is fastest when the disk is coplanar with the orbit. Despite the strong tidal perturbations and mass loss the dwarfs remain dark matter dominated. For most of the time the 1D stellar velocity dispersion, σ, follows the maximum circular velocity, V_{\rm max}, and they are both good tracers of the bound mass. Specifically, we find that M_{\rm bound} \propto V_{\rm max}^{3.5} and V_{\rm max} \sim \sqrt{3} σin agreement with earlier studies based on pure dark matter simulations. The latter relation is based on directly measuring the stellar kinematics of the simulated dwarf and may thus be reliably used to map the observed stellar velocity dispersions of dSphs to halo circular velocities when addressing the missing satellites problem.

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arXiv2009

Pairing of Supermassive Black Holes in unequal-mass galaxy mergers

We examine the pairing process of supermassive black holes (SMBHs) down to scales of 20-100 pc using a set of N-body/SPH simulations of binary mergers of disk galaxies with mass ratios of 1:4 and 1:10. Our numerical experiments are designed to represent merger events occurring at various cosmic epochs. The initial conditions of the encounters are consistent with the LambdaCDM paradigm of structure formation, and the simulations include the effects of radiative cooling, star formation, and supernovae feedback. We find that the pairing of SMBHs depends sensitively on the amount of baryonic mass preserved in the center of the companion galaxies during the last phases of the merger. In particular, due to the combination of gasdynamics and star formation, we find that a pair of SMBHs can form in 1:10 minor mergers provided that galaxies are relatively gas-rich (gas fractions of 30% of the disk mass) and that the mergers occur at relatively high redshift (z~3), when dynamical friction timescales are shorter. Since 1:10 mergers are most common events during the assembly of galaxies, and mergers are more frequent at high redshift when galaxies are also more gas-rich, our results have positive implications for future gravitational wave experiments such as the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna.

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arXiv2009

The Destruction of Thin Stellar Disks Via Cosmologically Common Satellite Accretion Events

Most Galaxy-sized systems (M_host ~ 10^12 M_sun) in the LCDM cosmology are expected to have accreted at least one satellite with a total mass M_sat ~ 10^11 M_sun = 3M_disk in the past 8 Gyr. Analytic and numerical investigations suggest that this is the most precarious type of merger for the survival of thin galactic disks because more massive accretion events are relatively rare and less massive ones preserve thin disk components. We use high-resolution, dissipationless N-body simulations to study the response of an initially-thin, fully-formed Milky-Way type stellar disk to these cosmologically common events and show that the thin disk does not survive. Regardless of orbital configuration, the impacts transform the disks into structures that are roughly three times as thick and more than twice as kinematically hot as the observed dominant thin disk component of the Milky Way. We conclude that if the Galactic thin disk is a representative case, then the presence of a stabilizing gas component is the only recourse for explaining the preponderance of disk galaxies in an LCDM universe; otherwise, the disk of the Milky Way must be uncommonly cold and thin for its luminosity, perhaps as a consequence of an unusually quiescent accretion history.

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arXiv2008

Formation of Nuclear Disks and Supermassive Black Hole Binaries in Multi-Scale Hydrodynamical Galaxy Mergers

(Abridged) We review the results of the first multi-scale, hydrodynamical simulations of mergers between galaxies with central supermassive black holes (SMBHs) to investigate the formation of SMBH binaries in galactic nuclei. We demonstrate that strong gas inflows produce nuclear disks at the centers of merger remnants whose properties depend sensitively on the details of gas thermodynamics. In numerical simulations with parsec-scale spatial resolution in the gas component and an effective equation of state appropriate for a starburst galaxy, we show that a SMBH binary forms very rapidly, less than a million years after the merger of the two galaxies. Binary formation is significantly suppressed in the presence of a strong heating source such as radiative feedback by the accreting SMBHs. We also present preliminary results of numerical simulations with ultra-high spatial resolution of 0.1 pc in the gas component. These simulations resolve the internal structure of the resulting nuclear disk down to parsec scales and demonstrate the formation of a central massive object (~ 10^8 Mo) by efficient angular momentum transport. This is the first time that a radial gas inflow is shown to extend to parsec scales as a result of the dynamics and hydrodynamics involved in a galaxy merger, and has important implications for the fueling of SMBHs. Due to the rapid formation of the central clump, the density of the nuclear disk decreases significantly in its outer region, reducing dramatically the effect of dynamical friction and leading to the stalling of the two SMBHs at a separation of ~1 pc. We discuss how the orbital decay of the black holes might continue in a more realistic model which incorporates star formation and the multi-phase nature of the ISM.

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arXiv2008

Cold Dark Matter Substructure and Galactic Disks

We perform a set of high-resolution, dissipationless N-body simulations to investigate the influence of cold dark matter (CDM) substructure on the dynamical evolution of thin galactic disks. Our method combines cosmological simulations of galaxy-sized CDM halos to derive the properties of substructure populations and controlled numerical experiments of consecutive subhalo impacts onto initially-thin, fully-formed disk galaxies. We demonstrate that close encounters between massive subhalos and galactic disks since z~1 should be common occurrences in LCDM models. In contrast, extremely few satellites in present-day CDM halos are likely to have a significant impact on the disk structure. One typical host halo merger history is used to seed controlled N-body experiments of subhalo-disk encounters. As a result of these accretion events, the disk thickens considerably at all radii with the disk scale height increasing in excess of a factor of 2 in the solar neighborhood. We show that interactions with the subhalo population produce a wealth of distinctive morphological signatures in the disk stars including: conspicuous flares; bars; low-lived, ring-like features in the outskirts; and low-density, filamentary structures above the disk plane. We compare a resulting dynamically-cold, ring-like feature in our simulations to the Monoceros ring stellar structure in the MW. The comparison shows quantitative agreement in both spatial distribution and kinematics, suggesting that such observed complex stellar components may arise naturally as disk stars are excited by encounters with subhalos. These findings highlight the significant role of CDM substructure in setting the structure of disk galaxies and driving galaxy evolution.

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arXiv2008

Cold Dark Matter Substructure and Galactic Disks I: Morphological Signatures of Hierarchical Satellite Accretion

(Abridged) We conduct a series of high-resolution, dissipationless N-body simulations to investigate the cumulative effect of substructure mergers onto thin disk galaxies in the context of the LCDM paradigm of structure formation. Our simulation campaign is based on a hybrid approach. Substructure properties are culled directly from cosmological simulations of galaxy-sized cold dark matter (CDM) halos. In contrast to what can be inferred from statistics of the present-day substructure populations, accretions of massive subhalos onto the central regions of host halos, where the galactic disk resides, since z~1 should be common occurrences. One host halo merger history is subsequently used to seed controlled numerical experiments of repeated satellite impacts on an initially-thin Milky Way-type disk galaxy. We show that these accretion events produce several distinctive observational signatures in the stellar disk including: a ring-like feature in the outskirts; a significant flare; a central bar; and faint filamentary structures that (spuriously) resemble tidal streams. The final distribution of disk stars exhibits a complex vertical structure that is well-described by a standard ``thin-thick'' disk decomposition. We conclude that satellite-disk encounters of the kind expected in LCDM models can induce morphological features in galactic disks that are similar to those being discovered in the Milky Way, M31, and in other disk galaxies. These results highlight the significant role of CDM substructure in setting the structure of disk galaxies and driving galaxy evolution. Upcoming galactic structure surveys and astrometric satellites may be able to distinguish between competing cosmological models by testing whether the detailed structure of galactic disks is as excited as predicted by the CDM paradigm.

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arXiv2008

The anatomy of Leo I: how tidal tails affect the kinematics

We model the recently published kinematic data set for Leo I dSph galaxy by fitting the solutions of the Jeans equations to the velocity dispersion and kurtosis profiles measured from the data. We demonstrate that when the sample is cleaned of interlopers the data are consistent with the assumption that mass follows light and isotropic stellar orbits with no need for an extended dark matter halo. Our interloper removal scheme does not clean the data of contamination completely, as demonstrated by the rotation curve of Leo I. When moving away from the centre of the dwarf, the rotation appears to be reversed. We interpret this behaviour using the results of an N-body simulation of a dwarf galaxy possessing some intrinsic rotation, orbiting in the Milky Way potential and show that it can be reproduced if the galaxy is viewed almost along the tidal tails so that the leading (background) tail contaminates the western part of Leo I while the trailing (foreground) tail the eastern one. We show that this configuration leads to a symmetric and Gaussian distribution of line-of-sight velocities. The simulation is also applied to test our modelling method on mock data sets. We demonstrate that when the data are cleaned of interlopers and the fourth velocity moment is used the true parameters of the dwarf are typically within 1 σerrors of the best-fitting parameters. Restricting the fitting to the inner part of Leo I our best estimate for the anisotropy is β= -0.2^{+0.3}_{-0.4} and the total mass M = (4.5 +/- 0.7) x 10^7 M_sun. The mass-to-light ratio including the errors in mass, brightness and distance is M/L_V = 8.2 +/- 4.5 solar units.

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arXiv2008

The Causes of Halo Shape Changes Induced by Cooling Baryons: Disks Versus Substructures

Cold dark matter cosmogony predicts triaxial dark matter halos, whereas observations find quite round halos. This is most likely due to the condensation of baryons leading to rounder halos. We examine the halo phase space distribution basis for such shape changes. Triaxial halos are supported by box orbits, which pass arbitrarily close to the density center. The decrease in triaxiality caused by baryons is thought to be due to the scattering of these orbits. We test this hypothesis with simulations of disks grown inside triaxial halos. After the disks are grown we check whether the phase space structure has changed by evaporating the disks and comparing the initial and final states. While the halos are substantially rounder when the disk is at full mass, their final shape after the disk is evaporated is not much different from the initial. Likewise, the halo becomes (more) radially anisotropic when the disk is grown, but the final anisotropy is consistent with the initial. Only if the baryons are unreasonably compact or massive does the halo change irreversibly. We show that the character of individual orbits is not generally changed by the growing mass. Thus the central condensation of baryons does not destroy enough box orbits to cause the shape change. Rather, box orbits merely become rounder along with the global potential. However, if angular momentum is transferred to the halo, either via satellites or via bars, a large irreversible change in the halo distribution occurs. The ability of satellites to alter the phase space distribution of the halo is of particular concern to galaxy formation simulations since halo triaxiality can profoundly influence the evolution of disks.

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