Relic galaxies: where are they?

Peralta de Arriba, P.; Quilis, V.; Trujillo, I.; Cebrián, M.; Balcells, M.
Bibliographical reference

Highlights on Spanish Astrophysics IX, Proceedings of the XII Scientific Meeting of the Spanish Astronomical Society held on July 18-22, 2016, in Bilbao, Spain, ISBN 978-84-606-8760-3. S. Arribas, A. Alonso-Herrero, F. Figueras, C. Hernández-Monteagudo, A. Sánchez-Lavega, S. Pérez-Hoyos (eds.), 2017 , p. 187-192

Advertised on:
3
2017
Number of authors
5
IAC number of authors
4
Citations
0
Refereed citations
0
Description
The finding that massive galaxies grow with cosmic time fired the starting gun for the search of objects which could have survived up to the present day without suffering substantial changes (neither in their structures, neither in their stellar populations). Nevertheless, and despite the community efforts, up to now only one firm candidate to be considered one of these relics is known: NGC 1277. Curiously, this galaxy is located at the centre of one of the most rich near galaxy clusters: Perseus. Is its location a matter of chance? Should relic hunters focus their search on galaxy clusters? In order to reply this question, we have performed a simultaneous and analogous analysis using simulations (Millennium I-WMAP7) and observations (New York University Value-Added Galaxy Catalogue). Our results in both frameworks agree: it is more probable to find relics in high density environments.