A centrally heated dark halo for our Galaxy

We construct a new family of models of our Galaxy in which dark matter and disc stars are both represented by distribution functions that are analytic functions of the action integrals of motion. The potential that is self-consistently generated by the dark matter, stars, and gas is determined, and...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inMonthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Vol. 465; no. 1; p. 798
Main Authors Cole, D R, Binney, James
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published London Oxford University Press 11.02.2017
Subjects
Accretion disks
Astronomical models
Dark matter
Distribution functions
Giant stars
Halos
Integrals
Kinematics
Mathematical models
Milky Way Galaxy
Star & galaxy formation
Stars
Sun
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Summary:We construct a new family of models of our Galaxy in which dark matter and disc stars are both represented by distribution functions that are analytic functions of the action integrals of motion. The potential that is self-consistently generated by the dark matter, stars, and gas is determined, and parameters in the distribution functions are adjusted until the model is compatible with observational constraints on the circular speed curve, the vertical density profile of the stellar disc near the Sun, the kinematics of nearly 200 000 giant stars within 2kpc of the Sun, and estimates of the optical depth to microlensing of bulge stars. We find that the data require a dark halo in which the phase-space density is approximately constant for actions [Math Processing Error]. In real space, these haloes have core radii ...2 kpc. (ProQuest: ... denotes formulae/symbols omitted.)
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-1
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
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content type line 23
ISSN:0035-8711
1365-2966
DOI:10.1093/mnras/stw2775