Realistic triaxial density–potential–force profiles for stellar systems and dark matter halos

Popular models for describing the luminosity-density profiles of dynamically hot stellar systems (e.g., Jaffe, Hernquist, Dehnen) were constructed to match the deprojected form of de Vaucouleurs’ R light-profile. However, we now know that elliptical galaxies and bulges display a mass-dependent range of structural profiles. To compensate this, the model in Terzić & Graham was designed to closely match the deprojected form of Sérsic R light-profiles, including deprojected exponential light-profiles and galaxies with partially depleted cores. It is thus applicable for describing bulges in spiral galaxies, dwarf elliptical galaxies, both “power-law” and “core” elliptical galaxies, also dark matter halos formed from ΛCDM cosmological simulations. In this paper, we present a new family of triaxial density-potential-force triplets, which generalizes the spherical model reported in Terzić & Graham to three dimensions. If the (optional) power-law core is present, it is a 5-parameter family, while in the absence of the core it reduces to 3 parameters. The isodensity contours in the new family are stratified on confocal ellipsoids and the potential and forces are expressed in terms of integrals which are easy to evaluate numerically. We provide the community with a suite of numerical routines for orbit integration, which feature: optimized computations of potential and forces for this family; the ability to run simulations on parallel platforms; and modular and easily editable design.