A wide-field photometric survey for extratidal tails around five metal-poor globular clusters in the Galactic halo

Abstract

Wide-field deep gri images obtained with the Megacam of the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope (CFHT) are used to investigate the spatial configuration of stars around five metal-poor globular cluster M15, M30, M53, NGC 5053, and NGC 5466, in a field-of-view ~3 degree. Applying a mask filtering algorithm to the color-magnitude diagrams of the observed stars, we sorted cluster's member star candidates that are used to examine the characteristics of the spatial stellar distribution surrounding the target clusters. The smoothed surface density maps and the overlaid isodensity contours indicate that all of the five metal-poor globular clusters exhibit strong evidence of extratidal overdensity features over their tidal radii, in the form of extended tidal tails around the clusters. The orientations of the observed extratidal features show signatures of tidal tails tracing the clusters' orbits, inferred from their proper motions, and effects of dynamical interactions with the Galaxy. Our findings include detections of a tidal bridge-like feature and an envelope structure around the pair of globular clusters M53 and NGC 5053. The observed radial surface density profiles of target clusters have a deviation from theoretical King models, for which the profiles show a break at 0.5~0.7r_t, extending the overdensity features out to 1.5~2r_t. Both radial surface density profiles for different angular sections and azimuthal number density profiles confirm the overdensity features of tidal tails around the five metal-poor globular clusters. Our results add further observational evidence that the observed metal-poor halo globular clusters originate from an accreted satellite system, indicative of the merging scenario of the formation of the Galactic halo.

arXiv comment69 pages, 21 figures, accepted for publication in the Astronomical Journal

References in corpus (68)

• Maps of Dust IR Emission for Use in Estimation of Reddening and CMBR Foregrounds
• Dark Matter Substructure in Galactic Halos
• Where are the missing galactic satellites?
• The USNO-B Catalog
• The u'g'r'i'z' Standard Star Network
• The Milky Way Tomography with SDSS: I. Stellar Number Density Distribution
• A 2MASS All-Sky View of the Sagittarius Dwarf Galaxy: I. Morphology of the Sagittarius Core and Tidal Arms
• Tracing Galaxy Formation with Stellar Halos I: Methods
• The Field of Streams: Sagittarius and its Siblings
• Dynamical evolution of star clusters in tidal fields
• The Ghost of Sagittarius and Lumps in the Halo of the Milky Way
• Resolved Massive Star Clusters in the Milky Way and its Satellites: Brightness Profiles and a Catalogue of Fundamental Parameters
• A giant stream of metal-rich stars in the halo of the galaxy M31
• Destruction of the Galactic Globular Cluster System
• Density profiles and substructure of dark matter halos: converging results at ultra-high numerical resolution
• Dark Matter Halos within Clusters
• Detection of massive tidal tails around the globular cluster Pal 5 with SDSS commissioning data
• A Low Latitude Halo Stream around the Milky Way
• Identification of A-colored Stars and Structure in the Halo of the Milky Way from SDSS Commissioning Data
• Sagittarius: The Nearest Dwarf Galaxy
• Multiple Stellar Populations in the Globular Cluster omega Centauri as Tracers of a Merger Event
• A dwarf galaxy remnant in Canis Major: the fossil of an in-plane accretion onto the Milky Way
• Detection of a 63 Degree Cold Stellar Stream in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
• The Kinematics, Orbit, and Survival of the Sagittarius Dwarf Spheroidal Galaxy
• The extended tails of Palomar 5: A ten degree arc of globular cluster tidal debris
• Hierarchical galaxy formation and substructure in the Galaxy's stellar halo
• Stars beyond Galaxies: The Origin of Extended Luminous Halos around Galaxies
• A Prescription for Building the Milky Way's Halo from Disrupted Satellites
• Galactic Halo substructure in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey: the ancient tidal stream from the Sagittarius dwarf galaxy
• Candidate RR Lyrae Stars Found in Sloan Digital Sky Survey Commissioning Data
• Globular Clusters with Tidal Tails: Deep Two-Color Star Counts
• Globular clusters, satellite galaxies and stellar haloes from early dark matter peaks
• Survival of Substructure within Dark Matter Haloes
• The Rise and Fall of Satellites in Galaxy Clusters
• Effects of Tidal Shocks on the Evolution of Globular Clusters
• Sagittarius Tidal Debris 90 kpc from the Galactic Center
• Modeling the disruption of the globular cluster Pal5 by Galactic tides
• Exploring Halo Substructure with Giant Stars: A diffuse star cloud or tidal debris around the Milky Way in Triangulum-Andromeda
• Building up the globular cluster system of the Milky Way. The contribution of the Sagittarius galaxy
• The Discovery of Tidal Tails Around NGC 5466
• Detection of a 45 Degree Tidal Stream Associated with the Globular Cluster NGC 5466
• Discovery of a New, Polar-Orbiting Debris Stream in the Milky Way Stellar Halo
• Measuring Mass Loss Rates from Galactic Satellites
• On the structure of tidal tails
• Galactic Indigestion: Numerical Simulations of the Milky Way's Closest Neighbor
• Kinematic Decoupling of Globular Clusters with Extended Horizontal-Branch
• A 500 Parsec Halo Surrounding the Galactic Globular NGC 1851
• On the Distribution of Orbital Poles of Milky Way Satellites
• The Assembly of Matter in Galaxy Clusters
• Merging of globular clusters within inner galactic regions. II. The Nuclear Star Cluster formation
• Tidal tails around globular clusters. Are they a good tracer of cluster orbits?
• A Comparison of Deep HST Luminosity Functions of Four Globular Clusters
• Interpreting the Morphology of Diffuse Light Around Satellite Galaxies
• Mass Segregation in the Globular Cluster Palomar 5 and its Tidal Tails
• Formation and evolution of clumpy tidal tails around globular clusters
• Family ties: abundances in Terzan 7, a Sgr dSph globular cluster
• The Closest View of a Dwarf Galaxy: New Evidence on the Nature of the Canis Major over-density
• Palomar 13's Last Stand
• Mergers of Globular Clusters
• An Aligned Stream of Low-Metallicity Clusters in the Halo of the Milky Way
• The Tidal Tails of NGC 5466
• Merging of globular clusters within inner galactic regions. I. Do they survive the tidal interaction?
• Wide field CCD photometry of the globular cluster M92
• Hubble Space Telescope Observations of Globular Clusters in M31 II: Structural Parameters
• Young Globular Clusters and Dwarf Spheroidals
• The Most Exciting Massive Binary Cluster in NGC 5128: Clues to the Formation of Globular Clusters
• Effects of External Tidal Field on the Evolution of Multi-mass Star Clusters
• The Blue Straggler population in the globular cluster M53 (NGC5024): a combined HST, LBT, CFHT study

Cited by in corpus (32)

• Multiple populations in globular clusters. Lessons learned from the Milky Way globular clusters
• The Abundances of Neutron Capture Species in the Very Metal-Poor Globular Cluster M15: An Uniform Analysis of RGB and RHB Stars
• Proper motions and dynamics of the Milky Way globular cluster system from Gaia DR2
• Assessing the Milky Way Satellites Associated with the Sagittarius Dwarf Spheroidal Galaxy
• The Tidal Origin of the Magellanic Stream and the Possibility of a Stellar Counterpart
• Exploring the Variable Sky with LINEAR. II. Halo Structure and Substructure Traced by RR Lyrae Stars to 30 kpc
• A Low-Mass Stellar-Debris Stream Associated with a Globular Cluster Pair in the Halo
• Search for Extratidal Features Around 17 Globular Clusters in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
• Discovery of tidal tails around the distant globular cluster Palomar 14
• The Outer Envelopes of Globular Clusters. I. NGC 7089 (M2)
• The eye of Gaia on globular clusters structure: tidal tails
• Purveyors of fine halos: Re-assessing globular cluster contributions to the Milky Way halo build-up with SDSS-IV
• A Wide-Field View on Multiple Stellar Populations in 28 Milky Way Globular Clusters
• Exploring the outskirts of globular clusters: the peculiar kinematics of NGC 3201
• The Metal-poor non-Sagittarius (?) Globular Cluster NGC 5053: Orbit and Mg, Al and Si Abundances
• Chemical abundances in the globular clusters NGC 5024 and NGC 5466 from optical and infrared spectroscopy
• Purveyors of fine halos. II. Chemodynamical association of halo stars with Milky Way globular clusters
• A low surface brightness halo surrounding the globular cluster NGC 5694
• The dynamics of the globular cluster NGC3201 out to the Jacobi radius
• Chemical Abundances in NGC 5053: A Very Metal-Poor and Dynamically Complex Globular Cluster
• Detection of open cluster rotation fields from Gaia EDR3 proper motions
• The Curious Case of Palomar 13: The Influence of the Orbital Phase on the Appearance of Galactic Satellites
• STREGA: STRucture and Evolution of the GAlaxy. I. Survey Overview and First Results
• The Kinematics of 30 Milky Way Globular Clusters and the Multiple Stellar Populations within
• On the density profile of the globular cluster M92
• Tidal stripping stellar substructures around four metal-poor globular clusters in the Galactic bulge
• Bayesian Analysis of Two Stellar Populations in Galactic Globular Clusters II: NGC 5024, NGC 5272, and NGC 6352
• Application of three-body stability to globular clusters: II. Observed velocity dispersions
• A Search for Extra-Tidal RR Lyrae in the Globular Cluster NGC 5024 and NGC 5053
• The Nephele ecosystem: stars, globular clusters, and stellar streams associated with the progenitor galaxy of $\omega$ Centauri
• Light Element Abundances and Multiple Populations in M53
• A search for stellar structures around nine outer halo globular clusters in the Milky Way