RSAA Colloquia / Seminars / Feast-of-Facts: Thursday, 06 September 2018, 11:00-12:00; Duffield Lecture Theatre


Rodrigo Canas

"Diffuse stellar component in state-of-the-art simulations of galaxy formation"

Key information about the formation and evolution of galaxies can be obtained from the diffuse stellar component that surrounds galaxies and clusters, and recent studies (e.g., Morishita et al, 2017; Merritt et al, 2016), have provided some insight on the formation and evolution of these structures in different environments. However, conclusions are still limited by the surface brightness detection limit and the size of the samples in observations. Numerical simulations hence provide an excellent complementary tool to track the evolution of these structures in a cosmological context. Using a new, improved version of the 6-D halo finder VELOCIraptor, we measure and characterise the diffuse, Intra-Halo Stellar Component (IHSC) of halos in a wide dynamic range, from MW-like halo masses to galaxy clusters, in state-of-the-art simulations of galaxy formation (Horizon-AGN, EAGLE and Illustris). This is the first time that such measurement is possible in such a wide dynamic range. In this talk I will be presenting the simulation predictions throughout cosmic time and what we can learn of the build-up of galaxies and halos from their IHSC.