Identifying Globular Cluster Populations in Hydrodynamical Simulationsof Milky-Way-Mass Galaxies

Globular Clusters (GCs) are old, compact star clusters whose formation, evolution, and current-day properties are not fully understood. In this work, we identify star particles formed in fully cosmological simulations of Milky Way-mass galaxies that may represent GC analogs. We assume that GCs form as star clusters from interstellar gas at high pressures. This yields a population of GC candidates that are uniformly old, similar to observed GCs. However, star particles are never destroyed in the simulation, since they represent a population of stars that includes low mass stars older than the Universe. Thus, we have also determined the Maximum Eigenvalue of the Tidal Tensor (METT) that a star particle ever experienced. We define a METT above which we assume the GC candidate would have been destroyed by tidal forces. Here we will present the properties of the “surviving” GCs in the simulation compared to observations, and explore their origin.