The origin of bars in simulations of Milky-Way like galaxies

最近来自欧洲航天局盖亚任务和其他任务的观测彻底改变了我们对银河系的看法，获得了几个令人兴奋的发现，包括一个极其复杂和丰富的“非平衡”动力结构。这种结构是由一系列的动力学现象形成的，比如星系棒、旋臂和合并。揭示这种结构的形成和演化是现代星系天体物理学的一个主要目标。这个项目的主要目的将是解开星系棒状结构与银河系合并历史之间的联系：棒状结构是由星系盘的内部长期演化形成的，还是由与盖亚-土卫二合并引发的？该项目将使用一套大型变焦模拟来探索合并和星棒形成之间的联系，并确定这些形成通道是否在星棒属性（轨道结构和恒星数量）方面留下了不同的特征，这些特征可以与观测结果进行比较。

Recent observations from ESA's Gaia mission and others have revolutionised how we see the Milky Way, garnering several exciting discoveries including an incredibly complex and rich "out-of-equilibrium" dynamical structure. This structure has been shaped by a wide range of dynamical phenomena, such as the galactic bar, spiral arms, and mergers. Unravelling the formation and evolution of this structure is a major goal of modern galactic astrophysics.The main aim of this project will be to unravel the connection between the galactic bar and the merger history of the Milky Way: did the bar form from the internal secular evolution of the disc, or was bar formation triggered by the merger with Gaia-Enceladus? The project will use a large suite of zoom simulations to explore the connection between mergers and bar formation, and determine if those formation channels leave different signatures in terms of bar properties (orbital structure and stellar populations) which could be compared with observations.