The abundance and radial distribution of faint and ultra-faint dwarfs in galaxy clusters

TL;DR

This study combines cosmological simulations and empirical models to estimate the abundance and distribution of faint and ultra-faint dwarf galaxies in galaxy clusters, predicting thousands of such satellites within the virial radius.

Contribution

It introduces a novel method to study dwarf galaxy populations below the resolution limit of cosmological simulations, calibrated with high-resolution N-body simulations.

Findings

Clusters host 2000-7000 dwarf galaxies with M* > 100 M_sun.

Dwarfs follow the dark matter profile within clusters.

Detection thresholds exclude heavily-stripped inner-region dwarfs.

Abstract

Cosmological simulations of galaxy clusters are unable to resolve dwarf galaxies due to limited numerical resolution which drives the artificial disruption of dark matter substructures. We address these limitations by combining the results of the cosmological hydrodynamical simulation TNG50 in $\Lambda$CDM with an empirical model of tidal evolution of cluster galaxies calibrated using high-resolution idealized N-body simulations. Applied to the three most massive clusters in TNG50, our model allows us to study the stellar mass and radial distribution of dwarfs well below the formal resolution limit of the parent simulation. We find that, at $z=0$, clusters with virial mass $M_{200} \sim 10^{14}~\mathrm{M_\odot}$ host a vast population of dwarf galaxies within the virial radius, amounting to $2000$-$7000$ systems with $M_* > 100~\mathrm{M_\odot}$. Taken together, these satellites follow a radial distribution that matches the underlying dark matter profile of the host. However, applying a minimum mass or luminosity threshold for detection, as expected in observational studies, tends to exclude the most heavily-stripped objects, which tend to populate the inner regions. Future surveys targeting ultra-faint galaxies in group and cluster environments, such as those made possible by the Euclid, Rubin, or Roman telescopes, will be fundamental to refute or confirm this prediction.