Stellar kinematics and metallicities in the ultra-faint dwarf galaxy Reticulum II
With this study, we present Magellan/M2FS, Very Large Telescope/GIRAFFE, and Gemini South/GMOS spectroscopy of the newly discovered Milky Way satellite Reticulum II. Based on the spectra of 25 Ret II member stars selected from Dark Energy Survey imaging, we measure a mean heliocentric velocity of $62.8\pm 0.5\;\mathrm{km}\;{\rm{s}}^{-1}$ and a velocity dispersion of $3.3\pm 0.7\;\mathrm{km}\;{\rm{s}}^{-1}$. The mass-to-light ratio of Ret II within its half-light radius is $470\pm 210\ {M}_{\odot }/{L}_{\odot }$, demonstrating that it is a strongly dark matter-dominated system. Despite its spatial proximity to the Magellanic Clouds, the radial velocity of Ret II differs from that of the LMC and SMC by 199 and 83 $\mathrm{km}\ {{\rm{s}}}^{-1}$, respectively, suggesting that it is not gravitationally bound to the Magellanic system. The likely member stars of Ret II span 1.3 dex in metallicity, with a dispersion of 0.28 ± 0.09 dex, and we identify several extremely metal-poor stars with ${\rm{[Fe/H]}}\lt -3$. In combination with its luminosity, size, and ellipticity, these results confirm that Ret II is an ultra-faint dwarf galaxy. With a mean metallicity of ${\rm{[Fe/H]}}=-2.65\pm 0.07$, Ret II matches Segue 1 as the most metal-poor galaxy known. Although Ret II is the third-closest dwarf galaxy to the Milky Way, the line-of-sight integral of the dark matter density squared is ${\mathrm{log}}_{10}(J)=18.8\pm 0.6\;\;\mathrm{GeV}{\;}^{2}\;{\mathrm{cm}}^{-5}\;$ within 0fdg2, indicating that the predicted gamma-ray flux from dark matter annihilation in Ret II is lower than that of several other dwarf galaxies.