The formation history of elliptical galaxies

We take advantage of the largest high-resolution simulation of cosmic structure growth ever carried out – the Millennium Simulation of the concordance Λ cold dark matter (CDM) cosmogony – to study how the star formation histories, ages and metallicities of elliptical galaxies depend on environment and on stellar mass. We concentrate on a galaxy formation model which is tuned to fit the joint luminosity/colour/morphology distribution of low-redshift galaxies. Massive ellipticals in this model have higher metal abundances, older luminosity-weighted ages and shorter star formation time-scales, but lower assembly redshifts, than less massive systems. Within clusters the typical masses, ages and metal abundances of…

• AV
  Alexander von Humboldt-Stiftung
• BF
  Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung