Tracing the Spatial Distribution of Stars in the Phoenix Dwarf Galaxy Beyond the Tidal Radius

Mathematics – Probability

Scientific paper

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Scientific paper

We propose to image the Phoenix dwarf galaxy out to and beyond its nominal tidal radius using a variant of the Washington photometry system that allows us to select associated red giant stars with imaging in only three filters. This technique, in combination with the Blanco 4m telescope and the wide-field imaging power of the Mosaic camera, can detect red giants out to several times the tidal radius. The study of Phoenix is a particularly important complement to our previous studies of nearby dSph galaxies because of its isolated location in the distant Galactic halo. We expect the interaction history of Phoenix to be very different than that of the nearby dwarfs. Because we will directly identify Phoenix stars with essentially no contamination from foreground Galactic stars, we will: (1) determine the spatial extent of Phoenix to very low stellar densities and see if this dSph shows a ``break population'', as has been found at large radii in all other Galactic satellite galaxies, (2) estimate the likelihood that Phoenix has interacted with the Milky Way, (3) fit periods for RR Lyrae stars in Phoenix using a combination of this new data and our previous observations for the purpose of refining its distance modulus and determining its place in the Oosterhoff continuum, and (4) identify high probability candidate RGB stars in Phoenix for followup spectroscopy for the purpose of deriving a velocity dispersion.

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