A 22° Tidal Tail for Palomar 5

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Abstract
Using Data Release 4 of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, we have applied an optimal-contrast, matched-filter technique to trace the trailing tidal tail of the globular cluster Palomar 5 to a distance of 185 from the center of the cluster. This more than doubles the total known length of the tail to some 22° on the sky. Based on a simple model of the Galaxy, we find that the stream's orientation on the sky is consistent at the 1.7 σ level with existing proper-motion measurements. We find that a spherical Galactic halo is adequate to model the stream over its currently known length, and we are able to place new constraints on the current space motion of the cluster.
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