Bibcode
DOI
Noël, Noelia E. D.; Gallart, Carme
Referencia bibliográfica
The Astrophysical Journal, Volume 665, Issue 1, pp. L23-L26.
Fecha de publicación:
8
2007
Revista
Número de citas
35
Número de citas referidas
27
Descripción
We report the detection of intermediate-age and old stars belonging to
the SMC at 6.5 kpc from the SMC center in the southern direction. We
show, from the analysis of three high-quality
34'×33' CMDs, that the age composition of
the stellar population is similar at galactocentric distances of ~4.7,
~5.6, and ~6.5 kpc. The surface brightness profile of the SMC follows an
exponential law, with no evidence of truncation, all the way out to 6.5
kpc. These results, taken together, suggest that the SMC ``disk''
population is dominating over a possible old Milky Way-like stellar halo
and that the SMC may be significantly larger than previously thought.