The Invisibles: A Detection Algorithm to Trace the Faintest Milky Way Satellites

dc.contributor.authorWalsh, Shane
dc.contributor.authorWillman, Beth
dc.contributor.authorJerjen, Helmut
dc.date.accessioned2015-12-08T22:09:03Z
dc.date.issued2009
dc.date.updated2016-02-24T09:55:12Z
dc.description.abstractA specialized data-mining algorithm has been developed using wide-field photometry catalogs, enabling systematic and efficient searches for resolved, extremely low surface brightness satellite galaxies in the halo of the Milky Way (MW). Tested and calibrated with the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 6 (SDSS-DR6) we recover all 15 MW satellites recently detected in SDSS, six known MW/Local Group dSphs in the SDSS footprint, and 19 previously known globular and open clusters. In addition, 30 point-source overdensities have been found that correspond to no cataloged objects. The detection efficiencies of the algorithm have been carefully quantified by simulating more than three million model satellites embedded in star fields typical of those observed in SDSS, covering a wide range of parameters including galaxy distance, scale length, luminosity, and Galactic latitude. We present several parameterizations of these detection limits to facilitate comparison between the observed MW satellite population and predictions. We find that all known satellites would be detected with >90% efficiency over all latitudes spanned by DR6 and that the MW satellite census within DR6 is complete to a magnitude limit of MV -6.5 and a distance of 300 kpc. Assuming all existing MW satellites contain an appreciable old stellar population and have sizes and luminosities comparable with currently known companions, we predict lower and upper limit totals of 52 and 340 MW dwarf satellites within 260 kpc if they are uniformly distributed across the sky. This result implies that many MW satellites still remain undetected. Identifying and studying these elusive satellites in future survey data will be fundamental to test the dark matter distribution on kpc scales.
dc.identifier.issn0004-6256
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/1885/28858
dc.publisherUniversity of Chicago Press
dc.sourceAstronomical Journal
dc.subjectKeywords: Dark matter; Galaxies: dwarf; Local Group
dc.titleThe Invisibles: A Detection Algorithm to Trace the Faintest Milky Way Satellites
dc.typeJournal article
local.bibliographicCitation.issue1
local.bibliographicCitation.lastpage469
local.bibliographicCitation.startpage450
local.contributor.affiliationWalsh, Shane, College of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, ANU
local.contributor.affiliationWillman, Beth, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
local.contributor.affiliationJerjen, Helmut, College of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, ANU
local.contributor.authoremailu9611777@anu.edu.au
local.contributor.authoruidWalsh, Shane, u4191351
local.contributor.authoruidJerjen, Helmut, u9611777
local.description.embargo2037-12-31
local.description.notesImported from ARIES
local.identifier.absfor020103 - Cosmology and Extragalactic Astronomy
local.identifier.ariespublicationu3356449xPUB61
local.identifier.citationvolume137
local.identifier.doi10.1088/0004-6256/137/1/450
local.identifier.scopusID2-s2.0-62549136797
local.identifier.thomsonID000262343000039
local.identifier.uidSubmittedByu3356449
local.type.statusPublished Version

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