The orientation of planes of dwarf galaxies3D Model
This visualization shows how the normals of planes of satellite dwarf galaxies orbiting giant galaxies are aligned with the eigenvectors of the velocity shear tensor (a measure of the directions of compressions and expansions due to the local structure) obtained in the quasi linear construction of the nearby Universe.
Galaxies from the Kourkchi-Tully Groups Catalog are shown as black spheres in a box with dimensions (32, 26, 12) Mpc which include both our Local Group of galaxies and the Virgo cluster. The normals of a selection of planes of dwarf galaxies are shown as thick orange lines. The eigenvectors of the shear field (e1, e2, e3) are shown by red, green, blue solid lines for positive eigenvalues and dashed lines for negative eigenvalues.
This visualization has been produced as part of the following paper: “The orientation of planes of dwarf galaxies in the quasi-linear Universe” by N.I. Libeskind, et al., accepted for publication by MNRAS (2019). Preprint: https://arxiv.org/abs/1909.07720
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