Abstract
In the hierarchical formation scenario in which the outer halo of the Milky
Way is the result of the continuous accretion of low-mass galaxies, a fraction
of the Galactic globular cluster system might have originated in and been
accreted with already extinct dwarf galaxies. In this context, we expect that
the remnants of these progenitor galaxies might be still populating the
surroundings of those accreted globulars. In this work, we present wide-field
photometry of a sample of 23 globular clusters in the Galactocentric distance
range 10 < Rg < 40kpc, which we use to search for remnants of their
hypothetical progenitor systems. Our deep photometry reveals the presence of
underlying stellar populations along the line-of-sight of about half of the
globulars included in our sample. Among the detections lying in the footprint
of the Sagittarius tidal stream, which we identify via the comparison with its
orbit derived from numerical simulations, only Whiting1 and NGC7492 seem to be
inmersed in that remnant at a compatible heliocentric distance. We also confirm
the existence of a subjacent Main-Sequence feature in the surroundings of
NGC1851. A tentative detection of the vast Hercules-Aquila cloud is unveiled in
the background of NGC7006.
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