| Authors: | A. E. Piatti 1,2 |
| Affiliations: | (1) Instituto Interdisciplinario de Ciencias Básicas (ICB), CONICET-UNCUYO, Mendoza, Argentina; (2) Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET), Buenos Aires, Argentina |
| Accepted by: | Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society |
| URL: | https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2023arXiv230707419P/abstract |
The tangential velocity dispersion of stars belonging to the Milky Way globular cluster's tidal tails has recently been found from N-body simulations to be a parameter that distinguishes between cored and cuspy profiles of low-mass dwarf galaxy dark matter subhaloes where that globular cluster formed, and the in-situ formation scenario. In this context, we discovered that M5's tidal tails are composed by stars at two different metallicity regimes ([Fe/H] $\sim$ -1.4 dex and -2.0 dex). The more metal-rich tidal tail stars are of the same metal content than M5's members and have a tangential velocity dispersion that coincides with the predicted value for a cuspy formation scenario (subhalo mass $\sim$ 10$^9$ M$_{\odot}$). The more metal-poor stars, that are found along the entire M5 tidal tails and have similar distributions to their more metal-rich counterparts in the M5 colour-magnitude diagram and orbit trajectory, have a tangential velocity dispersion that refers to a cored subhalo (mass $\sim$ 10$^9$ M$_{\odot}$) or an in-situ formation scenario. In order to reconcile the dual distribution of M5 tidal tail stars, in kinematics and chemistry, we propose that M5 collided with another more metal-poor and less massive globular cluster anytime before or after it was accreted into the Milky Way.
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