2003/01/01 by Daisuke Kawata, Christopher Thom, Brad K. Gibson
Physics and Astronomy · #Astronomy and Astrophysical Research #Astrophysics and Star Formation Studies #Baryon #Bulge #Extension (predicate logic) #Galactic corona #Galactic tide #Large Magellanic Cloud #Milky Way #Satellite #Spiral galaxy #Stellar, planetary, and galactic studies #astro-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1071/as03028
7 pages, 5 figures, accepted for publication in PASA, High resolution version is available at http://astronomy.swin.edu.au/staff/dkawata/research/papers.html
openalex publication_date 2003/01/01 · arxiv created 2003/06/07 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Abstract We test the hypothesis that high-velocity gas cloud Complex C is actually a high-latitude spiral arm extension in the direction of the Galactic warp, as opposed to the standard interpretation — that of a once extragalactic, but now infalling, gas cloud. A parallel Tree N-body code was employed to simulate the tidal interaction of a satellite perturber with the Milky Way. We find that a model incorporating a perturber of the mass of the Large Magellanic Cloud on a south to north polar orbit, crossing the disk at ˜15 kpc, does yield a high-velocity, high-latitude extension consistent with the spatial, kinematical, and column density properties of Complex C. Unless this massive satellite remains undiscovered because of either a fortuitous alignment with the Galactic bulge (feasible within the framework of the model), or the lack of any associated baryonic component, we conclude that this alternative interpretation appears unlikely.