Bibcode
DOI
Noël, Noelia E. D.; Gallart, Carme
Bibliographical reference
The Astrophysical Journal, Volume 665, Issue 1, pp. L23-L26.
Advertised on:
8
2007
Journal
Citations
35
Refereed citations
27
Description
We report the detection of intermediate-age and old stars belonging to
the SMC at 6.5 kpc from the SMC center in the southern direction. We
show, from the analysis of three high-quality
34'×33' CMDs, that the age composition of
the stellar population is similar at galactocentric distances of ~4.7,
~5.6, and ~6.5 kpc. The surface brightness profile of the SMC follows an
exponential law, with no evidence of truncation, all the way out to 6.5
kpc. These results, taken together, suggest that the SMC ``disk''
population is dominating over a possible old Milky Way-like stellar halo
and that the SMC may be significantly larger than previously thought.