Author:

Keywords:

Evolution Strategies, Galaxy interaction

Abstract:

In this work we present Evolution Strategies (ES) as an efficient method to approximate the initial conditions of the main interacting group of three galaxies in M81. The M81 group is one of the nearest groups of galaxies. Its biggest galaxy, M81, sits at the core of the group together with its two companions M82 and NGC3077. The interaction between these three galaxies is very well defined on an image taken in HI. In this first attempt we use nonself- gravitating simulations to approximate the initial conditions; even with that restriction our method reproduces the density distribution of the three galaxies with great precision. Results presented here show that ES is an ideally suited method to work in optimization problems in Astrophysics, where the solution is hard to find by common methods. In particular we argue that ES is a good method to find initial conditions of groups of interacting galaxies, where a large number of parameters need to be determined.