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Clouds, Streams and Bridges. Redrawing the blueprint of the Magellanic System with Gaia DR1

Belokurov, V.; Erkal, D.; Deason, A.J.; Koposov, S.E.; De Angeli, F.; Wyn Evans, D.; Fraternali, F.; Mackey, D.

Clouds, Streams and Bridges. Redrawing the blueprint of the Magellanic System with Gaia DR1 Thumbnail


Authors

V. Belokurov

D. Erkal

S.E. Koposov

F. De Angeli

D. Wyn Evans

F. Fraternali

D. Mackey



Abstract

We present the discovery of stellar tidal tails around the Large and the Small Magellanic Clouds (LMC and SMC, respectively) in the Gaia DR1 data. In between the Clouds, their tidal arms are stretched towards each other to form an almost continuous stellar bridge. Our analysis relies on the exquisite quality of the Gaia's photometric catalogue to build detailed star-count maps of the Clouds. We demonstrate that the Gaia DR1 data can be used to detect variable stars across the whole sky, and, in particular, RR Lyrae stars in and around the LMC and the SMC. Additionally, we use a combination of Gaia and GALEX to follow the distribution of Young Main Sequence stars in the Magellanic System. Viewed by Gaia, the Clouds show unmistakable signs of interaction. Around the LMC, clumps of RR Lyrae are observable as far as ∼20°, in agreement with the most recent map of Mira-like stars reported in Deason et al. The SMC's outer stellar density contours show a characteristic S-shape, symptomatic of the onset of tidal stripping. Beyond several degrees from the centre of the dwarf, the Gaia RR Lyrae stars trace the Cloud's trailing arm, extending towards the LMC. This stellar tidal tail mapped with RR Lyrae is not aligned with the gaseous Magellanic Bridge, and is shifted by some ∼5° from the Young Main Sequence bridge. We use the offset between the bridges to put constraints on the density of the hot gaseous corona of the Milky Way.

Citation

Belokurov, V., Erkal, D., Deason, A., Koposov, S., De Angeli, F., Wyn Evans, D., …Mackey, D. (2016). Clouds, Streams and Bridges. Redrawing the blueprint of the Magellanic System with Gaia DR1. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 466(4), 4711-4730. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stw3357

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date Dec 20, 2016
Online Publication Date Dec 24, 2016
Publication Date Dec 24, 2016
Deposit Date Feb 20, 2017
Publicly Available Date Mar 29, 2024
Journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Print ISSN 0035-8711
Electronic ISSN 1365-2966
Publisher Royal Astronomical Society
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 466
Issue 4
Pages 4711-4730
DOI https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stw3357
Related Public URLs http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2016MNRAS.tmp.1588B

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Copyright Statement
This article has been accepted for publication in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society © 2016 The Authors
Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Royal Astronomical Society.





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