Bibcode
Montes, M.; Acosta-Pulido, J. A.; Prieto, M. A.; Fernández-Ontiveros, J. A.
Bibliographical reference
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Volume 442, Issue 2, p.1350-1362
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8
2014
Citations
11
Refereed citations
10
Description
We present a comprehensive multiwavelength photometric analysis of the
innermost (˜3 × 3 kpc2) 110 globular clusters
(GCs) of M87. Their spectral energy distributions (SEDs) were built
taking advantage of new ground-based high-resolution near-infrared
imaging aided by adaptive optics at the Very Large Telescope combined
with Hubble Space Telescope ultraviolet-optical archival data. These GC
SEDs are among the best photometrically sampled extragalactic GC SEDs.
To compare with our SEDs we constructed equally sampled SEDs of Milky
Way GCs. Using both these Milky Way cluster templates and different
stellar population models, ages of >10 Gyr and metallicities of
[Fe/H] ˜-0.6 dex are consistently inferred for the inner GCs of
M87. In addition, the metallicity of these GCs is low (Δ[Fe/H]
˜0.8 dex) compared to that of their host galaxy. These results
agree with the idea that the GC formation in M87 ceased earlier than
that of the bulk of the stars of the central part of the galaxy. The
ages of the inner GCs of M87 support the idea that these central parts
of the galaxy formed first. Our data do not support evidence of recent
wet merging.
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