Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astrophysics
Scientific paper
2005-07-28
J.Phys.Conf.Ser.47:195,2006
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astrophysics
10 pages, 10 figs, to appear in proceedings of conference "Physics at the end of the Galactic Cosmic Ray Spectrum", Journal of
Scientific paper
10.1088/1742-6596/47/1/024
We present minimum chi-squared fits of power law and Hernquist density profiles to F-turnoff stars in eight 2.5 deg wide stripes of SDSS data: five in the North Galactic Cap and three in the South Galactic cap. Portions of the stellar Galactic halo that are known to contain large streams of tidal debris or other lumpy structure, or that may include significant contamination from the thick disk, are avoided. The data strongly favor a model that is not symmetric about the Galaxy's axis of rotation. If included as a free parameter, the best fit to the center of the spheroid is surprisingly approx 3 kpc from the Galactic center in the direction of the Sun's motion. The model fits favor a low value of the density of halo stars at the solar position. The alternative to a non-axisymmetric stellar distribution is that our fits are contaminated by previously unidentified lumpy substructure.
Jo Newberg Heidi
Yanny Brian
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