2026/07/27 by Tetsuro Asano, Victor P. Debattista, Michiko S. Fujii
#astro-ph.GA
We aim to extend the action-based framework, proposed by a previous study, for assigning chemical information to collisionless N-body simulations of barred galaxies, enabling more realistic comparisons with observations. We developed a new method to map chemistry of star-forming N-body+hydrodynamical simulations (donor models) onto pure N-body simulations (target models) using a matching algorithm. We applied the method to two barred N-body galaxies, one Milky Way (MW)-like with a classical bulge and another with a strongly buckled bar, combined with two star-forming donor models exhibiting bimodal and unimodal chemical tracks in the [Fe/H]-[α/Fe] plane. Our models reproduce key chemo-dynamical trends observed in the MW and external galaxies. Metal-rich populations are more strongly associated with the X-shaped bulge morphology, leading to vertically pinched metallicity maps consistent with observations and chemo-hydrodynamical simulations. The [Fe/H]-[O/Fe] distributions show latitude-dependent bimodality, and the mock magnitude distributions of red clump stars reveal a stronger X-shape for metal-rich populations. In the model with a classical bulge, metal-poor stars exhibit a more spherical morphology on the longitude-latitude plane, while metal-rich stars show a boxy distribution, consistent with observations of the MW bulge. The proposed action-based chemical assignment provides a computationally efficient and flexible approach to link the dynamical and chemical evolution of barred galaxies. It enables realistic chemo-dynamical modelling of the galactic bulges.