First Ground-based Charge-coupled Device Proper Motions for Fornax. II. Final Results

Abstract

We present the first entirely ground-based astrometric determination of the proper motion for the Fornax Local Group Dwarf Spheroidal satellite galaxy of the Milky Way, using CCD data acquired with the ESO 3.5 m NTT telescope at La Silla Observatory in Chile. Our unweighted mean from five Quasar fields in the background of Fornax, used as fiducial reference points, leads to $\mu_\alpha \cos \delta=0.62 \pm 0.16$ $\masy$, and $\mu_\delta=-0.53 \pm 0.15$ $\masy$. A detailed comparison with all previous measurements of this quantity seems to imply that there is still no convincing convergence to a single value, perhaps indicating the existence of unnacounted systematic effects in (some of) these measurements. From all available proper motion and radial velocity measurements for Fornax, we compute Fornax's orbital parameters and their uncertainty using a realistic Galactic potential and a Monte Carlo simulation. Properties of the derived orbits are then compared to main star formation episodes in the history of Fornax. All published proper motion values imply that Fornax has recently (200-300 Myr ago) approached perigalacticon at a distance of $\sim$150 kpc. However, the derived period exhibits a large scatter, as does the apogalacticon. Our orbit, being the most energetic, implies a very large apogalactic distance of $\sim 950$ kpc. If this were the case, then Fornax would be a representative of an hypervelocity MW satellite in late infall.