The galaxy cross-correlation function as a probe of the spatial distribution of galactic satellites

The spatial distribution of satellite galaxies around host galaxies can illuminate the relationship between satellites and dark matter subhalos and aid in developing and testing galaxy formation modes. The projected cross-correlation of bright and faint galaxies offers a promising avenue to putting constraints on the radial distribution of satellite galaxies. Previous efforts to constrain the distribution attempted to eliminate interlopers from the measured projected number density of satellites and found that the distribution is generally consistent with the expected dark matter halo profile of the parent hosts. The measured projected cross-correlation can be used to analyze contributions from satellites and interlopers together, using a halo occupation distribution (HOD) based analytic model for galaxy clustering. Tests on mock catalogs constructed from simulations show promise in this approach. Analysis of Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) data shows results generally consistent with interloper subtraction methods, although the radial distribution is poorly constrained with the current dataset and larger samples are required.