Origin of the high vlos feature in the Galactic bar

Abstract

We analyse a controlled N-body+smoothed particle hydrodynamics simulation of a growing disc galaxy within a non-growing, live dark halo. The disc is continuously fed with gas and star particles on near-circular orbits and develops a bar comparable in size to the one of the Milky Way (MW).We extract line-of-sight velocity vlos distributions from the model and compare it to data recently obtained from the Apache Point Observatory Galactic Evolution Experiment (APOGEE) survey which show distinct high-velocity features around vlos ~ 200 km s-1.With an APOGEE-like selection function, but without any scaling nor adjustment, we find vlos distributions very similar to those in APOGEE. The stars that make up the high vlos features at positive longitudes l are preferentially young bar stars (age τ ≲ 2-3Gyr) which move away from us along the rear side of the bar. At negative l, we find the corresponding low vlos feature from stars moving towards us. At l > 10 deg, the highest vlos stars are a mixture of bar and background disc stars which complicates the interpretation of observations. The main peak in vlos is dominated by fore- and background stars. At a given time, ~40-50 per cent of high vlos stars occupy x1-like orbits, but a significant fraction are on more complex orbits. The observed feature is likely due to a population of dynamically cool, young stars formed from gas just outside the bar and subsequently captured by the growing bar. The high vlos features disappear at high latitudes |b| ≳ 2 deg which explains the non-detection of such features in other surveys.