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Short (inner) bars of subkiloparsec radius have been hypothesized to be an important mechanism for driving gas inflows to small scales, thus feeding central black holes (BHs). Recent numerical simulations have shown that the growth of central BHs in galaxies can destroy short bars, when the BH reaches a mass of ∼0.1% of the total stellar mass of the galaxy. We study N-body simulations of galaxies with single and double bars to track the long-term evolution of the central stellar mass distribution. We find that the destruction of the short bar contributes significantly to the growth of the bulge. The final bulge mass is roughly equal to the sum of the masses of the initial pseudo bulge and short bar. The initially boxy/peanut-shaped bulge of Sérsic index n ≲ 1 is transformed into a more massive, compact structure that bears many similarities to a classical bulge, in terms of its morphology (n ≈ 2), kinematics (dispersion-dominated, isotropic), and location on standard scaling relations (Kormendy relation, mass-size relation, and correlations between BH mass and bulge stellar mass and velocity dispersion). Our proposed channel for forming classical bulges relies solely on the destruction of short bars without any reliance on mergers. We suggest that some of the less massive, less compact classical bulges were formed in this manner. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Galaxies host a wide array of internal stellar components, which need to be decomposed accurately in order to understand their formation and evolution. While significant progress has been made with recent integral-field spectroscopic surveys of nearby galaxies, much can be learned from analyzing the large sets of realistic galaxies now available through state-of-the-art hydrodynamical cosmological simulations. We present an unsupervised machine-learning algorithm, named auto-GMM, based on Gaussian mixture models, to isolate intrinsic structures in simulated galaxies based on their kinematic phase space. For each galaxy, the number of Gaussian components allowed by the data is determined through a modified Bayesian information criterion. We test our method by applying it to prototype galaxies selected from the cosmological simulation IllustrisTNG. Our method can effectively decompose most galactic structures. The intrinsic structures of simulated galaxies can be inferred statistically by non-human supervised identification of galaxy structures. We successfully identify four kinds of intrinsic structures: cold disks, warm disks, bulges, and halos. Our method fails for barred galaxies because of the complex kinematics of particles moving on bar orbits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Compact ellipticals (cEs) are outliers from the scaling relations of early-type galaxies, particularly the mass–metallicity relation, which is an important outcome of feedback. The formation of such low-mass, but metal-rich and compact, objects is a long-standing puzzle. Using a pair of high-resolution N-body+gas simulations, we investigate the evolution of a gas-rich low-mass galaxy on a highly radial orbit around a massive host galaxy. As the infalling low-mass galaxy passes through the host’s corona at supersonic speeds, its diffuse gas outskirts are stripped by ram pressure, as expected. However, the compactness increases rapidly because of bursty star formation in the gas tidally driven to the center. The metal-rich gas produced by supernovae and stellar winds is confined by the ram pressure from the surrounding environment, leading to subsequent generations of stars being more metal-rich. After the gas is depleted, tidal interactions enhance the metallicity further via the stripping of weakly bound, old, and metal-poor stars, while the size of the satellite is changed only modestly. The outcome is a metal-rich cE that is consistent with observations. These results argue that classical cEs are neither the stripped remnants of much more massive galaxies nor the merger remnants of normal dwarfs. We present observable predictions that can be used to test our model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report results from an exploratory study implementing a new probe of Galactic evolution using archival Hubble Space Telescope imaging observations. Precise proper motions are combined with photometric relative metallicity and temperature indices, to produce the proper-motion rotation curves of the Galactic bulge separately for metal-poor and metal-rich main-sequence samples. This provides a “pencil-beam” complement to large-scale wide-field surveys, which to date have focused on the more traditional bright giant branch tracers. We find strong evidence that the Galactic bulge rotation curves drawn from “metal-rich” and “metal-poor” samples are indeed discrepant. The “metal-rich” sample shows greater rotation amplitude and a steeper gradient against line-of-sight distance, as well as possibly a stronger central concentration along the line of sight. This may represent a new detection of differing orbital anisotropy between metal-rich and metal-poor bulge objects. We also investigate selection effects that would be implied for the longitudinal proper-motion cut often used to isolate a “pure-bulge” sample. Extensive investigation of synthetic stellar populations suggests that instrumental and observational artifacts are unlikely to account for the observed rotation curve differences. Thus, proper-motion-based rotation curves can be used to probe chemodynamical correlations for main-sequence tracer stars, which are orders of magnitude more numerous in the Galactic bulge than the bright giant branch tracers. We discuss briefly the prospect of using this new tool to constrain detailed models of Galactic formation and evolution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The shape of line-of-sight velocity distributions (LOSVDs) carries important information about the internal dynamics of galaxies. The skewness of LOSVDs represents their asymmetric deviation from a Gaussian profile. Correlations between the skewness parameter (h3) and the mean velocity () of a Gauss–Hermite series reflect the underlying stellar orbital configurations of different morphological components. Using two self-consistent N-body simulations of disk galaxies with different bar strengths, we investigate correlations at different inclination angles. Similar to previous studies, we find anticorrelations in the disk area, and positive correlations in the bar area when viewed edge-on. However, at intermediate inclinations, the outer parts of bars exhibit anticorrelations, while the core areas dominated by the boxy/peanut-shaped (B/PS) bulges still maintain weak positive correlations. When viewed edge-on, particles in the foreground/background disk (the wing region) in the bar area constitute the main velocity peak, whereas the particles in the bar contribute to the high-velocity tail, generating the correlation. If we remove the wing particles, the LOSVDs of the particles in the outer part of the bar only exhibit a low-velocity tail, resulting in a negative correlation, whereas the core areas in the central region still show weakly positive correlations. We discuss implications for IFU observations on bars, and show that the variation of the correlation in the disk galaxy may be used as a kinematic indicator of the bar and the B/PS bulge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The velocity anisotropy parameter, β, is a measure of the kinematic state of orbits in the stellar halo, which holds promise for constraining the merger history of the Milky Way (MW). We determine global trends for β as a function of radius from three suites of simulations, including accretion-only and cosmological hydrodynamic simulations. We find that the two types of simulations are consistent and predict strong radial anisotropy () for Galactocentric radii greater than 10 kpc. Previous observations of β for the MW’s stellar halo claim a detection of an isotropic or tangential “dip” at r ∼ 20 kpc. Using the N-body+SPH simulations, we investigate the temporal persistence, population origin, and severity of “dips” in β. We find that dips in the in situ stellar halo are long-lived, while dips in the accreted stellar halo are short-lived and tied to the recent accretion of satellite material. We also find that a major merger as early as z ∼ 1 can result in a present-day low (isotropic to tangential) value of β over a broad range of radii and angles. While all of these mechanisms are plausible drivers for the β dip observed in the MW, each mechanism in the simulations has a unique metallicity signature associated with it, implying that future spectroscopic surveys could distinguish between them. Since an accurate knowledge of β(r) is required for measuring the mass of the MW halo, we note that significant transient dips in β could cause an overestimate of the halo’s mass when using spherical Jeans equation modeling. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In barred galaxies, the contours of stellar velocity dispersions (σ) are generally expected to be oval and aligned with the orientation of bars. However, many double-barred (S2B) galaxies exhibit distinct σ peaks on the minor axis of the inner bar, which we termed “σ-humps,” while two local σ minima are present close to the ends of inner bars, i.e., “σ-hollows.” Analysis of numerical simulations shows that -humps or hollows should play an important role in generating the observed σ-humps+hollows in low-inclination galaxies. In order to systematically investigate the properties of in barred galaxies, we apply the vertical Jeans equation to a group of well-designed three-dimensional bar+disk(+bulge) models. A vertically thin bar can lower along the bar and enhance it perpendicular to the bar, thus generating -humps+hollows. Such a result suggests that -humps+hollows can be generated by the purely dynamical response of stars in the presence of a sufficiently massive, vertically thin bar, even without an outer bar. Using self-consistent N-body simulations, we verify the existence of vertically thin bars in the nuclear-barred and S2B models that generate prominent σ-humps+hollows. Thus, the ubiquitous presence of σ-humps+hollows in S2Bs implies that inner bars are vertically thin. The addition of a bulge makes the -humps more ambiguous and thus tends to somewhat hide the -humps+hollows. We show that may be used as a kinematic diagnostic of stellar components that have different thicknesses, providing a direct perspective on the morphology and thickness of nearly face-on bars and bulges with integral field unit spectroscopy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using high-resolution N-body simulations, we recently reported that a dynamically cool inner disk embedded in a hotter outer disk can naturally generate a steady double-barred (S2B) structure. Here we study the kinematics of these S2B simulations, and compare them to integral-field observations from ATLAS 3D and SAURON. We show that S2B galaxies exhibit several distinct kinematic features, namely: (1) significantly distorted isovelocity contours at the transition region between the two bars, (2) peaks in σLOS along the minor axis of inner bars, which we term “σ-humps,” that are often accompanied by ring/spiral-like features of increased σLOS, (3) anti-correlations in the region of the inner bar for certain orientations, and (4) rings of positive h4 when viewed at low inclinations. The most impressive of these features are the σ-humps; these evolve with the inner bar, oscillating in strength just as the inner bar does as it rotates relative to the outer bar. We show that, in cylindrical coordinates, the inner bar has similar streaming motions and velocity dispersion properties as normal large-scale bars, except for σz, which exhibits peaks on the minor axis, i.e., humps. These σz humps are responsible for producing the σ-humps. For three well-resolved early-type S2Bs (NGC 2859, NGC 2950, and NGC 3941) and a potential S2B candidate (NGC 3384), the S2B model qualitatively matches the integral-field data well, including the “σ-hollows” previously identified. We also discuss the kinematic effect of a nuclear disk in S2Bs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine a large random sample of orbits in two self-consistent simulations of N-body bars. Orbits in these bars are classified both visually and with a new automated orbit classification method based on frequency analysis. The well-known prograde x1 orbit family originates from the same parent orbit as the box orbits in stationary and rotating triaxial ellipsoids. However, only a small fraction of bar orbits (∼4%) have predominately prograde motion like their periodic parent orbit. Most bar orbits arising from the x1 orbit have little net angular momentum in the bar frame, making them equivalent to box orbits in rotating triaxial potentials. In these simulations a small fraction of bar orbits (∼7%) are long-axis tubes that behave exactly like those in triaxial ellipsoids: they are tipped about the intermediate axis owing to the Coriolis force, with the sense of tipping determined by the sign of their angular momentum about the long axis. No orbits parented by prograde periodic x2 orbits are found in the pure bar model, but a tiny population (∼2%) of short-axis tube orbits parented by retrograde x4 orbits are found. When a central point mass representing a supermassive black hole (SMBH) is grown adiabatically at the center of the bar, those orbits that lie in the immediate vicinity of the SMBH are transformed into precessing Keplerian orbits that belong to the same major families (short-axis tubes, long-axis tubes and boxes) occupying the bar at larger radii. During the growth of an SMBH, the inflow of mass and outward transport of angular momentum transform some x1 and long-axis tube orbits into prograde short-axis tubes. This study has important implications for future attempts to constrain the masses of SMBHs in barred galaxies using orbit-based methods like the Schwarzschild orbit superposition scheme and for understanding the observed features in barred galaxies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

NGC 4395 is a bulgeless spiral galaxy, harboring one of the nearest known type 1 Seyfert nuclei. Although there is no consensus on the mass of its central engine, several estimates suggest it is one of the lightest massive black holes (MBHs) known. We present the first direct dynamical measurement of the mass of this MBH from a combination of two-dimensional gas kinematic data, obtained with the adaptive optics assisted near-infrared integral field spectrograph Gemini/NIFS and high-resolution multiband photometric data from Hubble Space Telescope's Wide Field Camera 3. We use the photometric data to model the shape and stellar mass-to-light ratio of the nuclear star cluster (NSC). From the Gemini/NIFS observations, we derive the kinematics of warm molecular hydrogen gas as traced by emission through the H2 1–0 S(1) transition. These kinematics show a clear rotational signal, with a position angle orthogonal to NGC 4395's radio jet. Our best-fitting tilted ring models of the kinematics of the molecular hydrogen gas contain a black hole with mass M⊙ (3σ uncertainties) embedded in an NSC of mass M⊙. Our black hole mass measurement is in excellent agreement with the reverberation mapping mass estimate of Peterson et al. but shows some tension with other mass measurement methods based on accretion signals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

About one-third of early-type barred galaxies host small-scale secondary bars. The formation and evolution of such double-barred (S2B) galaxies remain far from being well understood. In order to understand the formation of such systems, we explore a large parameter space of isolated pure-disk simulations. We show that a dynamically cool inner disk embedded in a hotter outer disk can naturally generate a steady secondary bar while the outer disk forms a large-scale primary bar. The independent bar instabilities of inner and outer disks result in long-lived double-barred structures whose dynamical properties are comparable to those in observations. This formation scenario indicates that the secondary bar might form from the general bar instability, the same as the primary bar. Under some circumstances, the interaction of the bars and the disk leads to the two bars aligning or single, nuclear, bars only. Simulations that are cool enough of the center to experience clump instabilities may also generate steady S2B galaxies. In this case, the secondary bars are “fast,” i.e., the bar length is close to the co-rotation radius. This is the first time that S2B galaxies containing a fast secondary bar are reported. Previous orbit-based studies had suggested that fast secondary bars were not dynamically possible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]