Special Features of Galactic Dynamics

Abstract

The present lecture notes are an introduction to selected topics of {\it Galactic Dynamics}. The focus is on topics that we consider more relevant to the main theme of this workshop, {\it Celestial Mechanics}. This is not intended to be a review article. In fact, any of the topics below could be the subject of a separate review. Only the main ideas and notions are introduced, as well as some important currently open problems in each topic. Some relevant results from our own research are also presented. We discuss topics related mostly to the so-called {\it ellipsoidal components} of galaxies. These are \textbf{a)} the dark halos of both elliptical and disk galaxies, \textbf{b)} the luminous matter in elliptical galaxies, and \textbf{c)} the bulges of disk galaxies. We shall only occasionally refer to the dynamics of disks, bars or spiral structure.

96 pages, 37 figures, to appear in CNRS Workshop proceedings (2006). It will be published in Lecture Notes in Physics

References in corpus (8)

• Long-Time Correlations in the Stochastic Regime
• Dynamics of galaxy cores and supermassive black holes
• Orbital Structure of Collisionless Merger Remnants: On the Origin of Photometric and Kinematic Properties of Elliptical and S0 Galaxies
• Quasi-stationary states and incomplete violent relaxation in systems with long-range interactions
• Inconsistency in theories of violent-relaxation
• A family of models of partially relaxed stellar systems II. Comparison with the products of collisionless collapse
• A numerical comparison of theories of violent relaxation
• Dynamical properties of a family of collisionless models of elliptical galaxies

Cited by in corpus (15)

• Constraining sterile neutrino dark matter by phase-space density observations
• Statistical mechanics of collisionless orbits. I. Origin of central cusps in dark-matter halos
• The Einasto model for dark matter haloes
• Statistical mechanics of collisionless orbits. III. Comparison with N-body simulations
• On the relevance of chaos for halo stars in the Solar Neighbourhood
• On the relevance of chaos for halo stars in the solar neighbourhood II
• The Arrow of Time in the collapse of collisionless self-gravitating systems: non-validity of the Vlasov-Poisson equation during violent relaxation
• Effects of chaos on the detectability of stellar streams
• The differential energy distribution and the total integrated binding energy of dynamical models
• Statistical mechanics of self-gravitating systems: mixing as a criterion for indistinguishability
• Radially anisotropic systems with $r^{-\alpha }$ forces. II: radial-orbit instability
• A simple formula for the third integral of motion of disk-crossing stars in the Galaxy
• Effective power-law dependence of Lyapunov exponents on the central mass in galaxies
• Self-consistent dynamical models with a finite extent -- III. Truncated power-law spheres
• Self-consistent dynamical models with a finite extent -- I. The uniform density sphere