Exploring the metal-poor inner Galaxy with the Pristine survey

Anke Arentsen (AIP) Cambridge Fluids Network - fluids-related seminars 13 November 2019 1:15pm Sackler Lecture Theatre, IoA Old, metal-poor stars are not only expected to be present in the Milky Way halo and the dwarf galaxies. A prediction of simulations is that the fraction of stars that are both old and metal-poor is highest towards the centres of galaxies: in their bulges. However, the number density of (metal-rich) stars is very high towards the centre of the Milky Way, and as a result of that, targeted or very large surveys are needed to uncover significant samples of very metal-poor stars in this region of our Galaxy. In this talk, I will present the Pristine Inner Galaxy Survey (PIGS), which is building towards an unprecedented large sample of very metal-poor stars in the bulge region using metallicity-sensitive photometry. I will focus on our recent results on the kinematics of the metal-poor tail of the Galactic bulge.