The MAGellanic Inter-Cloud project (MAGIC) I: Evidence for intermediate-age stellar populations in between the Magellanic Clouds

Abstract

The origin of the gas in between the Magellanic Clouds (MCs) -- known as the `Magellanic Bridge' (MB) -- is puzzling. Numerical simulations suggest that the MB formed from tidally stripped gas and stars in a recent interaction between the MCs. However, the apparent lack of stripped intermediate- or old-age stars associated with the MB is at odds with this picture. In this paper, we present the first results from the MAGellanic Inter-Cloud program (MAGIC) aimed at probing the stellar populations in the inter-cloud region. We present observations of the stellar populations in two large fields located in between the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds (LMC/SMC), secured using the WFI camera on the 2.2 m telescope in La Silla. Using a synthetic color-magnitude diagram (CMD) technique, we present the first quantitative evidence for the presence of intermediate-age and old stars in the inter-Cloud region. The intermediate-age stars -- that make up ~28% of all stars in the region -- are not present in fields at a similar distance from the SMC in a direction pointing away from the LMC. This provides potential evidence that these intermediate-age stars could have been tidally stripped from the SMC. However, spectroscopic studies will be needed to confirm or rule out the tidal origin for the inter-Cloud gas and stars.

17 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ

References in corpus (7)

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• The Magellanic Bridge: The Nearest Purely Tidal Stellar Population
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• The Proper Motion Field Along the Magellanic Bridge: a New Probe of the LMC-SMC Interaction
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• The Magellanic Inter-Cloud Project (MAGIC) III: First spectroscopic evidence of a dwarf stripping a dwarf
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• The Large Magellanic Cloud stellar content with SMASH: I. Assessing the stability of the Magellanic spiral arms
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• The VMC survey -- XXXVIII. Proper motion of the Magellanic Bridge
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• The VMC survey -- XXXIX: Mapping metallicity trends in the Small Magellanic Cloud using near-infrared passbands
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• The VISCACHA survey -- VII. Assembly history of the Magellanic Bridge and SMC Wing from star clusters
• Presence of red giant population in the foreground stellar sub-structure of the Small Magellanic Cloud
• Spitzer View of Massive Star Formation in the Tidally Stripped Magellanic Bridge
• OGLE-ing the Magellanic System: Cepheids in the Bridge
• Lessons from the Magellanic System and its modeling
• VMC proper motions of the Magellanic Bridge
• Strömgren photometric metallicity map of the Magellanic Cloud stars using Gaia DR3--XP spectra