The Astrophysical Journal (Jan 2025)
The NGC 3109 Satellite System: The First Systematic Resolved Search for Dwarf Galaxies Around an SMC-mass Host
- Amandine Doliva-Dolinsky,
- Burçin Mutlu-Pakdil,
- Denija Crnojević,
- Dhayaa Anbajagane,
- Jeffrey L. Carlin,
- Jonah Medoff,
- David J. Sand,
- Erik Tollerud,
- Sungsoon Lim,
- Paul Bennet,
- Alex Drlica-Wagner,
- Catherine E. Fielder,
- Jonathan R. Hargis,
- Kai Herron,
- Laura Congreve Hunter,
- Michael G. Jones,
- Ananthan Karunakaran,
- Annika H. G. Peter,
- Aaron J. Romanowsky,
- Kristine Spekkens,
- Jay Strader,
- Beth Willman,
- Julio A. Carballo-Bello,
- William Cerny,
- Astha Chaturvedi,
- Nitya Kallivayalil,
- Clara E. Martínez-Vázquez,
- Gustavo E. Medina,
- Noelia E. D. Noël,
- Andrew B. Pace,
- Alex H. Riley,
- Joanna D. Sakowska,
- Adam Smercina,
- Kathy Vivas,
- Monika Adamów,
- Clecio R. Bom,
- Yumi Choi,
- Peter S. Ferguson,
- Mahdieh Navabi,
- Alfredo Zenteno,
- (DELVE Collaboration)
Affiliations
- Amandine Doliva-Dolinsky
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Tampa , 401 West Kennedy Boulevard, Tampa, FL 33606, USA ; [email protected]; Department of Physics and Astronomy, Dartmouth College , Hanover, NH 03755, USA; Department of Physics, University of Surrey , Guildford GU2 7XH, UK
- Burçin Mutlu-Pakdil
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, Dartmouth College , Hanover, NH 03755, USA
- Denija Crnojević
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Tampa , 401 West Kennedy Boulevard, Tampa, FL 33606, USA ; [email protected]
- Dhayaa Anbajagane
- ORCiD
- Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, University of Chicago , Chicago, IL 60637, USA
- Jeffrey L. Carlin
- ORCiD
- AURA/Rubin Observatory , 950 North Cherry Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85719, USA
- Jonah Medoff
- ORCiD
- Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, University of Chicago , Chicago, IL 60637, USA; Department of Physics, Harvard University , 17 Oxford Street, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA
- David J. Sand
- ORCiD
- Steward Observatory, University of Arizona , 933 North Cherry Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85721-0065, USA
- Erik Tollerud
- ORCiD
- Space Telescope Science Institute , 3700 San Martin Drive, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA
- Sungsoon Lim
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Tampa , 401 West Kennedy Boulevard, Tampa, FL 33606, USA ; [email protected]; Department of Astronomy, Yonsei University , 50 Yonsei-ro, Seodaemun-gu, Seoul 03722, Republic of Korea
- Paul Bennet
- ORCiD
- Space Telescope Science Institute , 3700 San Martin Drive, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA
- Alex Drlica-Wagner
- ORCiD
- Astronomy & Astrophysics, University of Chicago , Chicago, IL 60637, USA; Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory , Batavia, IL, USA
- Catherine E. Fielder
- ORCiD
- Steward Observatory, University of Arizona , 933 North Cherry Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85721-0065, USA
- Jonathan R. Hargis
- ORCiD
- Space Telescope Science Institute , 3700 San Martin Drive, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA
- Kai Herron
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, Dartmouth College , Hanover, NH 03755, USA
- Laura Congreve Hunter
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, Dartmouth College , Hanover, NH 03755, USA
- Michael G. Jones
- ORCiD
- Steward Observatory, University of Arizona , 933 North Cherry Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85721-0065, USA
- Ananthan Karunakaran
- ORCiD
- Department of Astronomy & Astrophysics, University of Toronto , Toronto, ON M5S 3H4, Canada; Dunlap Institute for Astronomy and Astrophysics, University of Toronto , Toronto ON, M5S 3H4, Canada
- Annika H. G. Peter
- ORCiD
- CCAPP, Department of Physics, and Department of Astronomy, The Ohio State University , Columbus, OH 43210, USA
- Aaron J. Romanowsky
- ORCiD
- University of California Observatories , 1156 High Street, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA; Department of Physics & Astronomy, San José State University , One Washington Square, San Jose, CA 95192, USA
- Kristine Spekkens
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics, Engineering Physics and Astronomy, Queen’s University , Kingston, ON K7L 3N6, Canada
- Jay Strader
- ORCiD
- Center for Data Intensive and Time Domain Astronomy, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Michigan State University , East Lansing, MI 48824, USA
- Beth Willman
- ORCiD
- LSST Discovery Alliance , 933 North Cherry Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85719, USA
- Julio A. Carballo-Bello
- ORCiD
- Instituto de Alta Investigación, Universidad de Tarapacá , Casilla 7D, Arica, Chile
- William Cerny
- ORCiD
- Department of Astronomy, Yale University , New Haven, CT 06520, USA
- Astha Chaturvedi
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics, University of Surrey , Guildford GU2 7XH, UK
- Nitya Kallivayalil
- ORCiD
- Department of Astronomy, University of Virginia , Charlottesville, VA 22904, USA
- Clara E. Martínez-Vázquez
- ORCiD
- International Gemini Observatory/NSF NOIRLab , 670 N. A’ohoku Place, Hilo, HI 96720, USA
- Gustavo E. Medina
- ORCiD
- Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, University of Toronto , 50 St. George Street, Toronto ON, M5S 3H4, Canada
- Noelia E. D. Noël
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics, University of Surrey , Guildford GU2 7XH, UK
- Andrew B. Pace
- ORCiD
- Department of Astronomy, University of Virginia , 530 McCormick Road, Charlottesville, VA 22904, USA
- Alex H. Riley
- ORCiD
- Institute for Computational Cosmology, Department of Physics, Durham University , South Road, Durham DH1 3LE, UK
- Joanna D. Sakowska
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics, University of Surrey , Guildford GU2 7XH, UK
- Adam Smercina
- ORCiD
- Space Telescope Science Institute , 3700 San Martin Drive, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA
- Kathy Vivas
- ORCiD
- Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory/NSF NOIRLab , Casilla 603, La Serena, Chile
- Monika Adamów
- ORCiD
- Center for Astrophysical Surveys , National Center for Supercomputing Applications, 1205 West Clark St., Urbana, IL 61801, USA
- Clecio R. Bom
- ORCiD
- Centro Brasileiro de Pesquisas Físicas , Rua Dr. Xavier Sigaud 150, 22290-180 Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil
- Yumi Choi
- ORCiD
- NSF NOIRLab , 950 N. Cherry Avemue, Tucson, AZ 85719, USA
- Peter S. Ferguson
- ORCiD
- DIRAC Institute, Department of Astronomy, University of Washington , 3910 15th Avenue NE, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
- Mahdieh Navabi
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics, University of Surrey , Guildford GU2 7XH, UK
- Alfredo Zenteno
- ORCiD
- Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory/NSF NOIRLab , Casilla 603, La Serena, Chile
- (DELVE Collaboration)
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ade9b8
- Journal volume & issue
-
Vol. 989,
no. 1
p. 21
Abstract
We report the results of the deepest search to date for dwarf galaxies around NGC 3109, a barred spiral galaxy with a mass similar to that of the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC), using a semiautomated search method. Using the Dark Energy Camera, we survey a region covering a projected distance of ∼70 kpc of NGC 3109 ( D = 1.3 Mpc, R _vir ∼ 90 kpc, M ∼ 10 ^8 M _* ) as part of the MADCASH and DELVE-DEEP programs. We introduce a newly developed semiresolved search method, used alongside a resolved search, to identify crowded dwarf galaxies around NGC 3109. Using both approaches, we successfully recover the known satellites Antlia and Antlia B. We identified a promising candidate, which was later confirmed to be a background dwarf through deep follow-up observations. Our detection limits are well defined, with the sample ∼80% complete down to M _V ∼ −8.0, and include detections of dwarf galaxies as faint as M _V ∼ −6.0. This is the first comprehensive study of a satellite system through resolved stars around an SMC mass host. Our results show that NGC 3109 has more bright ( M _V ∼ −9.0) satellites than the mean predictions from cold dark matter models, but well within the host-to-host scatter. A larger sample of LMC/SMC-mass hosts is needed to test whether or not the observations are consistent with current model expectations.
Keywords
