The stellar halos of ETGs in the IllustrisTNG simulations: II. Accretion, merger history, and dark halo connection

Abstract

Stellar halos in early-type galaxies (ETGs) are shaped by their accretion and merger histories. We use a sample of 1114 ETGs in the TNG100 simulation with stellar masses $10^{10.3}\le M_{\ast }/M_{\odot }\le 10^{12}$, selected at z=0 within the range of g-r colour and lambda-ellipticity diagram populated by observed ETGs. We study how the rotational support and intrinsic shapes of the stellar halos depend on the fraction of accreted stars, overall and separately by major, minor, and mini mergers. Accretion histories in TNG100 ETGs as well as the radial distributions of ex-situ stars $f_{ex}(R)$ strongly correlate with stellar mass. Low-mass ETGs have characteristic peaked rotation profiles and near-oblate shapes with rounder halos that are completely driven by the in-situ stars. At high $f_{ex}$ major mergers decrease the in-situ peak in rotation velocity, flatten the $V_{\ast }/{\sigma }_{\ast }(R)$ profiles, and increase the triaxiality of the stellar halos. Kinematic transition radii do not trace the transition between in-situ and ex-situ dominated regions, but for systems with $M_{\ast }>10^{10.6}{M}_{\odot }$ the local rotational support decreases with the local ex-situ fraction $f_{ex}(R)$ and triaxiality increases with $f_{ex}$. These correlations are followed by fast and slow rotators alike with a continuous and overlapping sequence of properties. Merger events dynamically couple stars and dark matter: in high mass ETGs and at large radii where $f_{ex}\gtrsim 0.5$, both components tend to have similar intrinsic shapes and rotational support, and nearly aligned principal axes and spin directions. Based on these results we suggest that extended photometry and kinematics of massive ETGs ($M_{\ast }>10^{10.6}{M}_{\odot }$) can be used to estimate the local fraction of ex-situ stars and to approximate the intrinsic shapes and rotational support of the co-spatial dark matter component. [abridged]

22 pages, 17 figures, accepted for publication on A&A update version including a new section on high-redshift compact progenitor galaxies and a new Appendix with with tables reporting relevant physical relations derived throughout this paper

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