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The Formation and Evolution of Disk Galaxies

Bird, Jonathan C.
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1345571232

Abstract Details

2012, Doctor of Philosophy, Ohio State University, Astronomy.
Current and next generation surveys of the Milky Way promise to revolutionize our observational perspective of the Galaxy. My dissertation uses a suite of N-body and SPH simulations of disk galaxies to make testable predictions of the assembly history of the Milky Way and identify observational probes that take advantage of the forthcoming data. APOGEE, an infrared survey of the Galaxy and a component of the SDSS-III, will measure the distance, radial velocity, and multi-element chemistry of 10^5 stars located throughout the Galaxy, making it particularly well suited for comparison with simulations. We first use a fuel-consumption argument to constrain the integrated luminosity of the TP-AGB phase; the energy release in this phase is a major uncertainty in stellar population synthesis models. Our initial numerical investigation explores how the minor mergers expected in Lambda-CDM and inherent properties of stellar disks affect the dynamics of stellar radial migration- an essential ingredient in understanding the evolution of the Milky Way and disk galaxies in general. We discover that the resonances and mechanisms responsible for migration are different in isolated and satellite-bombarded galaxies, resulting in distinct migration patterns and potential observational signatures of accretion events. Continuing our development of tools to describe the chemo-dynamics of the disk, we construct statistics to measure overdensities and characterize outliers in the distance, radial velocity projection of phase space. I discuss mock APOGEE observations of our numerical simulations and demonstrate that our statistics can begin to discriminate between significant galaxy formation mechanisms given the data available in the near term. Finally, we use a state of the art cosmological simulation to describe the evolution of mono-age stellar populations and their eventual assembly into a galaxy resembling the Milky Way. Galaxy formation theory faces the exciting challenge of an unprecedented level of statistical scrutiny: imminent and ongoing surveys such as SEGUE, RAVE, APOGEE, LAMOST, and HERMES offer an extraordinary opportunity to unravel the formation history of the Milky Way.
David Weinberg, PhD (Advisor)
Jennifer Johnson, PhD (Committee Member)
Marc Pinsonneault, PhD (Committee Member)
196 p.
Astronomy; Astrophysics
Galaxy formation; astrophysics; near-field cosmology

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Bird, J. C. (2012). The Formation and Evolution of Disk Galaxies [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1345571232

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Bird, Jonathan. The Formation and Evolution of Disk Galaxies. 2012. Ohio State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1345571232.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Bird, Jonathan. "The Formation and Evolution of Disk Galaxies." Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 2012. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1345571232

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

osu1345571232
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© 2012, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by The Ohio State University and OhioLINK.