Accreted or Not Accreted? The Fraction of Accreted Mass in Galaxies from Simulations and Observations

TL;DR

This study combines simulations and observations to analyze the distribution of accreted versus in-situ stellar mass in galaxies, revealing correlations with galaxy mass, merger history, and challenging previous interpretations of surface brightness features.

Contribution

It provides a detailed classification of galaxies based on accretion and in-situ dominance, linking these to merger histories and offering insights into galaxy assembly processes.

Findings

Higher mass galaxies have larger accreted fractions.

Approximately 70% of galaxies have one transition radius.

Surface brightness dips are linked to merger history, not in-situ/accumulation transition.

Abstract

In the two-phase scenario of galaxy formation, a galaxy's stellar mass growth is first dominated by in-situ star formation, and subsequently by accretion. We analyse the radial distribution of the accreted stellar mass in ~500 galaxies from the hydrodynamical cosmological simulation Magneticum. Generally, we find good agreement with other simulations in that higher mass galaxies have larger accreted fractions, but we predict higher accretion fractions for low-mass galaxies. Based on the radial distribution of the accreted and in-situ components, we define 6 galaxy classes, from completely accretion dominated to completely in-situ dominated, and measure the transition radii between in-situ and accretion-dominated regions for galaxies that have such a transition. About 70% of our galaxies have one transition radius. However, we also find about 10% of the galaxies to be accretion dominated everywhere, and about 13% to have two transition radii, with the centre and the outskirts both being accretion dominated. We show that these classes are strongly correlated with the galaxy merger histories, especially with the mergers' cold gas fractions. We find high total in-situ (low accretion) fractions to be associated with smaller, lower mass galaxies, lower central dark matter fractions, and larger transition radii. Finally, we show that the dips in observed surface brightness profiles seen in many early-type galaxies do not correspond to the transition from in-situ to accretion-dominated regions, and any inferred mass fractions are not indicative of the true accreted mass. Instead, these dips contain information about the galaxies' dry minor merger assembly history.