MODELING GD-1 GAPS IN A MILKY WAY POTENTIAL

Abstract

ABSTRACT The GD-1 star stream is currently the best available for identifying density fluctuations, “gaps,” along its length as a test of the LCDM prediction of large numbers of dark matter sub-halos orbiting in the halo. Density variations of some form are present, since the variance of the density along the stream is three times that expected from the empirically estimated variation in the filtered mean star counts. The density variations are characterized with filters that approximate the shape of sub-halo, gravitationally induced stream gaps. The filters locate gaps and measure their amplitude, leading to a measurement of the distribution of gap widths. To gain an understanding of the factors influencing the gap width distribution, a suite of collisionless n-body simulations for a GD-1-like orbit in a Milky-Way-like potential provides a dynamically realistic statistical prediction of the gap distribution. The simulations show that every location in the stream has been disturbed to some degree by a sub-halo. The small gaps found via the filtering are largely noise. Larger gaps, those longer than 1 kpc, or 10° for GD-1, are the source of the excess variance. The suite of stream simulations shows that sub-halos at the predicted inner halo abundance or possibly somewhat higher can produce the required large-scale density variations.