The accretion history of the Milky Way: III. Hydrodynamical simulations of Galactic dwarf galaxies at first infall

Abstract

ABSTRACT Most Milky Way dwarf galaxies are much less bound to their host than are relics of Gaia–Sausage–Enceladus and Sgr. These dwarfs are expected to have fallen into the Galactic halo less than 3 Gyr ago, and will therefore have undergone no more than one full orbit. Here, we have performed hydrodynamical simulations of this process, assuming that their progenitors are gas-rich, rotation-supported dwarfs. We follow their transformation through interactions with the hot corona and gravitational field of the galaxy. Our dedicated simulations reproduce the structural properties of three dwarf galaxies: Sculptor, Antlia II, and with somewhat a lower accuracy, Crater II. This includes reproducing their large velocity dispersions, which are caused by ram-pressure stripping and Galactic tidal shocks. Differences between dwarfs can be interpreted as due to different orbital paths, as well as to different initial conditions for their progenitor gas and stellar contents. However, we failed to suppress in a single orbit the rotational support of our Sculptor analogue if it is fully dark matter dominated. In addition, we have found that classical dwarf galaxies like Sculptor may have stellar cores sufficiently dense to survive the pericentre passage through adiabatic contraction. On the contrary, our Antlia II and Crater II analogues are tidally stripped, explaining their large sizes, extremely low surface brightnesses, and velocity dispersion. This modelling explains differences between dwarf galaxies by reproducing them as being at different stages of out-of-equilibrium stellar systems.