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Quenching Timescales of Dwarf Satellites around Milky Way–mass Hosts
- Source :
- The Astrophysical Journal. 909:139
- Publication Year :
- 2021
- Publisher :
- American Astronomical Society, 2021.
-
Abstract
- Observations of the low-mass satellites in the Local Group have shown high fractions of gas-poor, quiescent galaxies relative to isolated dwarfs, implying that the host halo environment plays an important role in the quenching of dwarf galaxies. In this work, we present measurements of the quenched fractions and quenching timescales of dwarf satellite galaxies in the DC Justice League suite of 4 high-resolution cosmological zoom-in simulations of Milky Way-mass halos. We show that these simulations accurately reproduce the satellite luminosity functions of observed nearby galaxies, as well as the variation in satellite quenched fractions from $M_* \sim 10^5$ solar masses to $10^{10}$ solar masses. We then trace the histories of satellite galaxies back to $z \sim 15$, and find that many satellites with $M_* \sim 10^{6-8}$ solar masses quench within 2 Gyr of infall into the host halo, while others in the same mass range remain star-forming for as long as 5 Gyr. We show that this scatter can be explained by the satellite's gas mass and the ram pressure it feels at infall. Finally, we identify a characteristic stellar mass scale of $10^8$ solar masses above which infalling satellites are largely resistant to rapid environmental quenching.<br />16 pages, 7 figures, accepted to ApJ
- Subjects :
- Physics
Solar mass
Stellar mass
010308 nuclear & particles physics
Milky Way
FOS: Physical sciences
Local Group
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astrophysics::Cosmology and Extragalactic Astrophysics
Astrophysics
Astrophysics - Astrophysics of Galaxies
01 natural sciences
Galaxy
Space and Planetary Science
Astrophysics of Galaxies (astro-ph.GA)
Physics::Space Physics
0103 physical sciences
Galaxy formation and evolution
Satellite galaxy
Astrophysics::Solar and Stellar Astrophysics
Astrophysics::Earth and Planetary Astrophysics
010303 astronomy & astrophysics
Astrophysics::Galaxy Astrophysics
Dwarf galaxy
Subjects
Details
- ISSN :
- 15384357 and 0004637X
- Volume :
- 909
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- The Astrophysical Journal
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....7e3221e3527331f8c755c908c0c6327c