Accurate Model of the Projected Velocity Distribution of Galaxies in Dark Matter Halos

TL;DR

This paper introduces a highly accurate model for the line-of-sight velocity distribution of galaxies around dark matter halos, enabling better understanding of galaxy dynamics and halo properties from spectroscopic data.

Contribution

The authors develop a novel model that decomposes galaxy velocities into three classes and accurately recovers velocity profiles, improving analysis of galaxy-halo systems.

Findings

Successfully distinguishes galaxy types using velocity data

Halo edge radius correlates with three-dimensional measurements

Velocity dispersion profiles reveal mass-dependent parameters

Abstract

We present a percent-level accurate model of the line-of-sight velocity distribution of galaxies around dark matter halos as a function of projected radius and halo mass. The model is developed and tested using synthetic galaxy catalogs generated with the UniverseMachine run on the Multi-Dark Planck 2 N-body simulations. The model decomposes the galaxies around a cluster into three kinematically distinct classes: orbiting, infalling, and interloping galaxies. We demonstrate that: 1) we can statistically distinguish between these three types of galaxies using only projected line-of-sight velocity information; 2) the halo edge radius inferred from the line-of-sight velocity dispersion is an excellent proxy for the three-dimensional halo edge radius; 3) we can accurately recover the full velocity dispersion profile for each of the three populations of galaxies. Importantly, the velocity dispersion profiles of the orbiting and infalling galaxies contain five independent parameters -- three distinct radial scales and two velocity dispersion amplitudes -- each of which is correlated with mass. Thus, the velocity dispersion profile of galaxy clusters has inherent redundancies that allow us to perform nontrivial systematics check from a single data set. We discuss several potential applications of our new model for detecting the edge radius and constraining cosmology and astrophysics using upcoming spectroscopic surveys.