Substructure and Tidal Debris in Local Galaxies: Models and Observations

Abstract

One of the generic predictions of modern cosmological models is that large galaxies should have experienced many mergers with smaller galaxies at some point in their past. Debris from such encounters will leave spatially distinct substructure in the stellar haloes of nearby galaxies, detectable for a few orbital periods after the final merger. In the case of the Milky Way, kinematic data from surveys such as RAVE and satellite missions such as GAIA will allow us to probe much more of the merger history, and to connect the properties of the stellar halo with those of local dwarf galaxies. To estimate what these programmes may discover, we review current observations of minor mergers in nearby galaxies, and compare these with predictions from a semi-analytic model of galaxy formation.