Studying stellar halos with future facilities

TL;DR

This paper discusses how future large telescopes and space-based observatories will enhance the study of stellar halos, providing insights into galaxy formation processes and halo properties.

Contribution

It highlights the potential advancements in observing stellar halos with upcoming facilities like E-ELT and JWST, improving constraints on galaxy formation models.

Findings

Current facilities limit halo observations to nearby galaxies.

Future telescopes will enable detailed studies of distant stellar halos.

Predicted improvements include better understanding of halo substructure and stellar populations.

Abstract

Stellar halos around galaxies retain fundamental evidence of the processes which lead to their build up. Sophisticated models of galaxy formation in a cosmological context yield quantitative predictions about various observable characteristics, including the amount of substructure, the slope of radial mass profiles and three dimensional shapes, and the properties of the stellar populations in the halos. The comparison of such models with the observations provides constraints on the general picture of galaxy formation in the hierarchical Universe, as well as on the physical processes taking place in the halos formation. With the current observing facilities, stellar halos can be effectively probed only for a limited number of nearby galaxies. In this paper we illustrate the progress that we expect in this field with the future ground based large aperture telescopes (E-ELT) and with space based facilities as JWST.