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Reconstructing galaxy histories from globular clusters

Nature volume 427, pages 31–35 (2004)Cite this article

Abstract

Nearly a century after the true nature of galaxies as distant ‘island universes’ was established, their origin and evolution remain great unsolved problems of modern astrophysics. One of the most promising ways to investigate galaxy formation is to study the ubiquitous globular star clusters that surround most galaxies. Globular clusters are compact groups of up to a few million stars. They generally formed early in the history of the Universe, but have survived the interactions and mergers that alter substantially their parent galaxies. Recent advances in our understanding of the globular cluster systems of the Milky Way and other galaxies point to a complex picture of galaxy genesis driven by cannibalism, collisions, bursts of star formation and other tumultuous events.

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Figure 1: Extragalactic globular cluster systems.
Figure 2: Histograms of globular cluster metallicities in three galaxies.
Figure 3: Hubble Space Telescope image of a colliding pair of galaxies.
Figure 4: A giant elliptical galaxy in the cluster Abell 3827.

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Acknowledgements

We thank J. Brodie, W. Harris and S. van den Bergh for comments that helped to improve this manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Hawaii, 200 W. Kawili Street, Hilo, Hawaii, 96720, USA

    Michael J. West

  2. Department of Physics and Astronomy, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, 136 Frelinghuysen Road, Piscataway, New Jersey, 08854, USA

    Patrick Côté & Andrés Jordán

  3. Department of Physics and Astronomy, San Francisco State University, 1600 Holloway Avenue, San Francisco, California, 94132, USA

    Ronald O. Marzke

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West, M., Côté, P., Marzke, R. et al. Reconstructing galaxy histories from globular clusters. Nature 427, 31–35 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature02235

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