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Identifying stellar streams in Gaia DR2 with data mining techniques

Borsato, Nicholas LU orcid ; Martell, Sarah L. and Simpson, Jeffrey (2019) In Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 492(1). p.1370-1384
Abstract
Streams of stars from captured dwarf galaxies and dissolved globular clusters are identifiable through the similarity of their orbital parameters, a fact that remains true long after the streams have dispersed spatially. We calculate the integrals of motion for 31 234 stars, to a distance of 4 kpc from the Sun, which have full and accurate 6D phase space positions in the Gaia DR2 catalogue. We then apply a novel combination of data mining, numerical, and statistical techniques to search for stellar streams. This process returns five high confidence streams (including one which was previously undiscovered), all of which display tight clustering in the integral of motion space. Colour–magnitude diagrams indicate that these streams are... (More)
Streams of stars from captured dwarf galaxies and dissolved globular clusters are identifiable through the similarity of their orbital parameters, a fact that remains true long after the streams have dispersed spatially. We calculate the integrals of motion for 31 234 stars, to a distance of 4 kpc from the Sun, which have full and accurate 6D phase space positions in the Gaia DR2 catalogue. We then apply a novel combination of data mining, numerical, and statistical techniques to search for stellar streams. This process returns five high confidence streams (including one which was previously undiscovered), all of which display tight clustering in the integral of motion space. Colour–magnitude diagrams indicate that these streams are relatively simple, old, metal-poor populations. One of these resolved streams shares very similar kinematics and metallicity characteristics with the Gaia-Enceladus dwarf galaxy remnant, but with a slightly younger age. The success of this project demonstrates the usefulness of data mining techniques in exploring large data sets. (Less)
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author
; and
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
keywords
methods: data analysis, Galaxy: kinematics and dynamics, Galaxy: structure
in
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
volume
492
issue
1
article number
492
pages
15 pages
publisher
Oxford University Press
external identifiers
  • scopus:85079461822
ISSN
1365-2966
DOI
10.1093/mnras/stz3479
language
English
LU publication?
no
id
09b4dfb7-286d-45e8-90ec-a5b4f38eb85b
date added to LUP
2020-08-27 12:22:53
date last changed
2025-04-04 15:29:54
@article{09b4dfb7-286d-45e8-90ec-a5b4f38eb85b,
  abstract     = {{Streams of stars from captured dwarf galaxies and dissolved globular clusters are identifiable through the similarity of their orbital parameters, a fact that remains true long after the streams have dispersed spatially. We calculate the integrals of motion for 31 234 stars, to a distance of 4 kpc from the Sun, which have full and accurate 6D phase space positions in the Gaia DR2 catalogue. We then apply a novel combination of data mining, numerical, and statistical techniques to search for stellar streams. This process returns five high confidence streams (including one which was previously undiscovered), all of which display tight clustering in the integral of motion space. Colour–magnitude diagrams indicate that these streams are relatively simple, old, metal-poor populations. One of these resolved streams shares very similar kinematics and metallicity characteristics with the Gaia-Enceladus dwarf galaxy remnant, but with a slightly younger age. The success of this project demonstrates the usefulness of data mining techniques in exploring large data sets.}},
  author       = {{Borsato, Nicholas and Martell, Sarah L. and Simpson, Jeffrey}},
  issn         = {{1365-2966}},
  keywords     = {{methods: data analysis; Galaxy: kinematics and dynamics; Galaxy: structure}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  month        = {{12}},
  number       = {{1}},
  pages        = {{1370--1384}},
  publisher    = {{Oxford University Press}},
  series       = {{Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society}},
  title        = {{Identifying stellar streams in Gaia DR2 with data mining techniques}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stz3479}},
  doi          = {{10.1093/mnras/stz3479}},
  volume       = {{492}},
  year         = {{2019}},
}