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At least 541 records · Page 30
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2020

Structural and stellar-population properties versus bulge types in Sloan Digital Sky Survey central galaxies

ABSTRACT This paper studies pseudo-bulges (P-bulges) and classical bulges (C-bulges) in Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) central galaxies using the new bulge indicator ΔΣ1, which measures relative central stellar-mass surface density within 1 kpc. We compare ΔΣ1 to the established bulge-type indicator Δ〈μe〉 from Gadotti (2009) and show that classifying by ΔΣ1 agrees well with Δ〈μe〉. ΔΣ1 requires no bulge–disc decomposition and can be measured on SDSS images out to z = 0.07. Bulge types using it are mapped on to 20 different structural and stellar-population properties for 12 000 SDSS central galaxies with masses 10.0 < log M*/M⊙ < 10.4. New trends emerge from this large sample. Structural parameters show fairly linear log–log relations versus ΔΣ1 and Δ〈μe〉 with only moderate scatter, while stellar-population parameters show a highly non-linear ‘elbow’ in which specific star formation rate remains roughly flat with increasing central density and then falls rapidly at the elbow, where galaxies begin to quench. P-bulges occupy the low-density end of the horizontal arm of the elbow and are universally star forming, while C-bulges occupy the elbow and the vertical branch and exhibit a wide range of star formation rates at a fixed density. The non-linear relation between central density and star formation rate has been seen before, but this mapping on to bulge class is new. The wide range of star formation rates in C-bulges helps to explain why bulge classifications using different parameters have sometimes disagreed in the past. The elbow-shaped relation between density and stellar indices suggests that central structure and stellar populations evolve at different rates as galaxies begin to quench.

Luo, Yifei↗
DOE OSTI2022

$\mathrm{BUDDI}$-$\mathrm{MaNGA}$ $\mathrm{I}$: A statistical sample of cleanly decomposed bulge and disc spectra

Many galaxies display clear bulges and discs, and understanding how these components form is a vital step towards understanding how the galaxy has evolved into what we see today. The BUDDI-MaNGA project aims to study galaxy evolution and morphological transformations through the star-formation histories of the bulges and discs. We have applied our buddi software to galaxies from the MaNGA Survey in the SDSS DR15 in order to isolate their bulge and disc spectra, from which we derived their stellar populations. To date, this work provides the largest sample of clean bulge and disc spectra extracted from IFU datacubes using the galaxies light profile information, and will form the basis for a series of papers aiming to answer open questions on how galaxies have formed and evolved, and the role of their individual structures. Here this paper presents an introduction to the project, including an overview of these fits, a characterization of the sample, and a series of tests on the fits to ensure reliability.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
NASA NTRS2016

Arcus: The X-Ray Grating Spectrometer Explorer

Arcus will be proposed to the NASA Explorer program as a free-flying satellite mission that will enable high-resolution soft X-ray spectroscopy (8-50 Angstroms) with unprecedented sensitivity-effective areas of greater than 500 sq cm and spectral resolution greater than 2500. The Arcus key science goals are (1) to determine how baryons cycle in and out of galaxies by measuring the effects of structure formation imprinted upon the hot gas that is predicted to lie in extended halos around galaxies, groups, and clusters, (2) to determine how black holes influence their surroundings by tracing the propagation of out-flowing mass, energy and momentum from the vicinity of the black hole out to large scales and (3) to understand how accretion forms and evolves stars and circumstellar disks by observing hot infalling and outflowing gas in these systems. Arcus relies upon grazing incidence silicon pore X-ray optics with the same 12m focal length (achieved using an extendable optical bench) that will be used for the ESA Athena mission. The focused X-rays from these optics will then be diffracted by high-efficiency off-plane reflection gratings that have already been demonstrated on sub-orbital rocked flights, imaging the results with flight-proven CCD detectors and electronics. The power and telemetry requirements on the spacecraft are modest. The majority of mission operations will not be complex, as most observations will be long (~100 ksec), uninterrupted, and pre-planned, although there will be limited capabilities to observe targets of opportunity, such as tidal disruption events or supernovae with a 3-5 day turnaround. After the end of prime science, we plan to allow guest observations to maximize the science return of Arcus to the community.

Instrumentation↗
NASA NTRS2002

Hubble Space Telescope Imaging of the Circumnuclear Environments of the CfA Seyfert Galaxies: Nuclear Spirals and Fueling

We present archival Hubble Space Telescope (HST) images of the nuclear regions of 43 of the 46 Seyfert galaxies found in the volume limited,spectroscopically complete CfA Redshift Survey sample. Using an improved method of image contrast enhancement, we created detailed high-quality " structure maps " that allow us to study the distributions of dust, star clusters, and emission-line gas in the circumnuclear regions (100-1000 pc scales) and in the associated host galaxy. Essentially all of these Seyfert galaxies have circumnuclear dust structures with morphologies ranging from grand-design two-armed spirals to chaotic dusty disks. In most Seyfert galaxies there is a clear physical connection between the nuclear dust spirals on hundreds of parsec scales and large-scale bars and spiral arms in the host galaxies proper. These connections are particularly striking in the interacting and barred galaxies. Such structures are predicted by numerical simulations of gas flows in barred and interacting galaxies and may be related to the fueling of active galactic nuclei by matter inflow from the host galaxy disks. We see no significant differences in the circumnuclear dust morphologies of Seyfert 1s and 2s, and very few Seyfert 2 nuclei are obscured by large-scale dust structures in the host galaxies. If Sevfert 2s are obscured Sevfert Is, then the obscuration must occur on smaller scales than those probed by HST.

Pogge, Richard W.↗
DOE OSTI2025

Quantifying the Impact of LSST u -band Survey Strategy on Photometric Redshift Estimation and the Detection of Lyman-break Galaxies

The Vera C. Rubin Observatory will conduct the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST), promising to discover billions of galaxies out to redshift 7, using six photometric bands (ugrizy) spanning the near-ultraviolet to the near-infrared. The exact number of and quality of information about these galaxies will depend on survey depth in these six bands, which in turn depends on the LSST survey strategy, i.e., how often and how long to expose in each band. u-band depth is especially important for photometric redshift (photo-z) estimation and for detection of high-redshift Lyman-break galaxies (LBGs). In this paper, we use a simulated galaxy catalog and an analytic model for the LBG population to study how recent updates and proposed changes to Rubin’s u-band throughput and LSST survey strategy impact photo-z accuracy and LBG detection. We find that proposed variations in u-band strategy have a small impact on photo-z accuracy for z < 1.5 galaxies, but the outlier fraction, scatter, and bias for higher-redshift galaxies vary by up to 50%, depending on the survey strategy considered. The number of u-band dropout LBGs at z ∼ 3 is also highly sensitive to the u-band depth, varying by up to 500%, while the number of griz-band dropouts is only modestly affected. Under the new u-band strategy recommended by the Rubin Survey Cadence Optimization Committee, we predict u-band dropout number densities of 110 deg −2 (3200 deg −2 ) in year 1 (10) of LSST. We discuss the implications of these results for LSST cosmology.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2023

Chemical cartography with LAMOST and Gaia reveal azimuthal and spiral structure in the Galactic disc

Chemical Cartography, or mapping, of our Galaxy has the potential to fully transform our view of its structure and formation. In this work, we use chemical cartography to explore the metallicity distribution of OBAF-type disc stars from the LAMOST survey and a complementary sample of disc giant stars from Gaia DR3. We use these samples to constrain the radial and vertical metallicity gradients across the Galactic disc. We also explore whether there are detectable azimuthal variations in the metallicity distribution on top of the radial gradient. For the OBAF-type star sample from LAMOST, we find a radial metallicity gradient of Δ[Fe/H]/ΔR ~–0.078 ± 0.001 dex kpc –1 in the plane of the disc and a vertical metallicity gradient of Δ[Fe/H]/ΔZ ~–0.15 ± 0.01 dex kpc –1 in the solar neighbourhood. The radial gradient becomes shallower with increasing vertical height, while the vertical gradient becomes shallower with increasing Galactocentric radius, consistent with other studies. We also find detectable spatially dependent azimuthal variations on top of the radial metallicity gradient at the level of ~0.10 dex. Interestingly, the azimuthal variations appear be close to the Galactic spiral arms in one data set (Gaia DR3) but not the other (LAMOST). Furthermore, these results suggest that there is azimuthal structure in the Galactic metallicity distribution and that in some cases it is co-located with spiral arms.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
NASA NTRS1993

Galactic fine-structure lines - Morphologies of the warm ionized interstellar medium

Far-infrared ionic fine-structure emission lines associated with the large-scale structure of the Galactic ionized medium are interpreted in terms of a heuristic model in which three distinct source morphologies are considered: ionization-bounded H II regions, an extended, low-density medium, and externally ionized surfaces of neutral clouds. The model reveals that the overall luminosity of the Galaxy in the fine-structure lines of both C II and N II is due, in comparable proportions, to diffuse medium and the boundaries between ionized and neutral regions. Limits are set on the luminosity of the diffuse component in the plane of the Galaxy. Some individual lines of sight of the COBE FIRAS instrument are dominated, in these spectral lines, by H II regions, even with its 7 deg field of view. Average densities of both H II regions and photodissociation regions are estimated on a Galactic scale.

Petuchowski, S. J.↗
NASA NTRS1995

The life cycle of the Interstellar Medium in other galaxies

Gas in spiral galaxies cycles between the diffuse and dense phases as clouds collapse, form stars and are dispersed back into the ISM. Far infrared observations of continuum emission from interstellar dust and line emission from interstellar gas have revealed a wealth of information on the state of the ISM in galaxies of different morphological types. The analysis of these observations gives us information about the processes of star formation and about the evolution of the ISM. Star formation rates vary widely from galaxy to galaxy, with the rates in starburst galaxies being 10 - 100 times those in quiescent spiral galaxies. Far infrared spectroscopy of star-forming galaxies shows that the interstellar pressure increases with star formation rate. The structure of the interstellar medium in starburst galaxies is quite different from that of quiescent galaxies - much of the mass and volume are in HII regions and photodissociation regions. The size distribution of dust grains seems to depend on environment; small grains are abundant in the diffuse interstellar medium but not in dense molecular star forming regions. Quiescent spiral and elliptical galaxies contain a significant population of small grains, but starburst galaxies do not. Dwarf irregular galaxies also seem to contain few small grains; this may be the result of the higher UV flux in these galaxies. The star forming regions in dwarf irregulars also have a higher ratio of atomic to molecular gas than do those in the Galaxy. These results show that the ISM in galaxies of different morphological types reaches different equilibria, resulting in different modes of star formation and global galaxy evolution.

Knapp, G. R.↗
DOE OSTI2020

The Ellipticity of Galaxy Clusters at a Large Radius

Galaxy clusters are the largest known gravitationally bound structures in the universe, consisting of hundreds to thousands of galaxies (Figure 1). Dark matter contributes the majority of mass to galaxy clusters, and therefore has a strong influence on the arrangement of member galaxies. By determining the shape of galaxy clusters, we can figure out the shape of the dark matter, which is important for cosmology and galaxy formation studies.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2023

Local and large-scale effects on the astrophysics of void galaxies

ABSTRACT Galaxies in cosmic voids have been reported with properties related to a delayed evolution compared to the rest of the Universe. These characteristics reflect the interaction of galaxies with the environment. However, it is not clear the degree of influence of the large-scale structure on the properties of void galaxies or if these are only influenced by the low local density around them typical of these regions. In this article, we identified cosmic voids in the SDSS-DR16 and studied the g–r colour, star formation rate, and concentration of galaxies. We identified galaxy groups to characterize the local environment and studied the properties of galaxies as a function of total and stellar masses, separately analysing those in voids and the general sample. Our results show that galaxies that inhabit haloes of a given mass (below ${\sim}10^{13.5}{\rm M}_{\odot }$), are bluer, have a higher star formation rate and are less concentrated when the host halo is inside voids compared to other regions. For larger halo masses, the trend disappears. We also analyse whether the properties of galaxies are sensitive to the type of voids that inhabit. This is done by separating voids embedded in overdense regions (S-type) from those that asymptotically converge to the average density of the Universe (R-type). We found that galaxies in R-type voids are bluer, with higher SFR and less concentration than in S-type voids. Our results indicate some degree of correlation of galaxy properties with the large-scale environment provided by voids, suggesting possible second-order mechanisms in galaxy evolution.

Astronomy & Astrophysics↗
DOE OSTI2022

How galaxies populate halos in extreme density environments: An analysis of the halo occupation distribution in SDSS

Recent works have shown that the properties of galaxy populations in simulated dark matter halos vary with large-scale environments. These results suggest a variation in the halo occupation distribution (HOD) in extreme density environments since the dynamical and astrophysical conditions prevailing in these regions may significantly affect the formation and evolution of their halos and residing galaxies, influencing the mean number of satellite galaxies. To analyse these effects, we identify cosmic voids and future virialised structures (FVS) in the Sloan Digital Sky Server Data Release 12 (SDSS-DR12) and estimate the HOD within these super-structures using group catalogues as dark matter halo proxies. Our goal is to use observational galaxy data to characterise the HOD within cosmic voids and FVS, explore the different properties of these galaxies populations and compare them with the general results outside these super-structures. We use a publicly available observational galaxy catalogue with information on redshifts, positions, magnitudes and other astrophysical features to build a volume complete galaxy sample and identify cosmic voids and FVS. Using a publicly available galaxy group catalogue as a proxy to dark matter halos, we compute the HOD within both types of super-structures for different absolute magnitude thresholds. We also study the dependence on the results on the main void and FVS properties, density and volume. We also analysed the main characteristics of the stellar content of galaxies inside these extreme-density regions such as the mean stellar age and the galaxy light concentration index. In all cases, we compare the results with those derived from the Field sample, defined by objects outside both types of environments. Inside cosmic voids, we find a strong decrease in HOD concerning the Field results. In the most extreme cases, the mean number of satellites fall to ~ 50%. Inside FVS, the HOD shows a significant increase to the Field, with a ~ 40% excess in the mean number of satellites. These results are present for the different galaxy luminosity ranges explored. In both environments, the differences with respect to the Field increases for the extreme values of the density environments. However, we obtain no signs of variations related to intrinsic characteristics of the super-structures, indicating that the effects depend mainly on the density of the large-scale environment. In addition, we find that the cumulative distribution of the mean age of stars of the central galaxy also varies in the different regions, this suggests that the history of the formation of the dark matter halos may be different. Finally, we explore the HOD for the 25% youngest (oldest) galaxies, based on the mean age of their stars. We find that for the low-mass groups the youngest galaxies are only present inside voids and are generally central galaxies. On the other hand, for the high-mass groups the FVS environments show the same increase in the HOD concerning the Field as previously mentioned. We find that cosmic voids lack a significant fraction of galaxies with the oldest stellar population.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
NASA NTRS1990

Neutral hydrogen in the starburst galaxy NGC3690/IC694

Researchers made observations of the neutral hydrogen (HI) emission structure surrounding the very deep absorption peak (observed earlier by Dickey (1986)) in the galaxy pair NGC3690/IC694. This galaxy pair is highly luminous in the far infrared, and known to exhibit extensive star formation as well as nuclear activity. Knowledge of the spatial distribution and velocity structure of the HI emission is of great importance to the understanding of the dynamics of the interaction and the resulting environmental effects on the galaxies.

Tolstoy, E.↗
NASA NTRS1994

The dynamical evolution of poor clusters of galaxies: Growth and properties of the first-ranked galaxy

We report N-body simulations of the dynamical evolution of isolated clusters of 50 galaxies containing a dark matter component that comprises 90% of the cluster mass. For our adopted physical scaling, the line-of-sight velocity dispersion of the cluster is 310 km/s and the initial core radius is 250 kpc. Our results are applicable to (1) present-day poor clusters, (2) the small systems that may have merged to produce present-day rich clusters, and (3) virialized subclumps within larger systems, in between major substructure merger events. We have evolved a total of 10 cluster models, using N = 40,000 particles per model. The models are fully self-consistent in that each galaxy is represented as an extended structure containing many particles and the gravitational potential arises from the particles alone. Dark matter is apportioned between the galaxy halos and a smoothly distributed common group halo, the intracluster background (ICB). The percentage of cluster mass initially in the ICB, Beta, is chosen to be 50, 75, or 90. Increasing Beta has the effect of removing mass from dark halos around galaxies and distributing it throughout the cluster. The initial conditions were constructed by randomly sampling a King distribution with W(sub 0) = 6. The galaxies are also King models; the masses of the galaxies follow a Schechter distribution function.

Bode, Paul W.↗
DOE OSTI2023

DESI mock challenge: Halo and galaxy catalogues with the bias assignment method

We present a novel approach to the construction of mock galaxy catalogues for large-scale structure analysis based on the distribution of dark matter halos obtained with effective bias models at the field level. We aim to produce mock galaxy catalogues capable of generating accurate covariance matrices for a number of cosmological probes that are expected to be measured in current and forthcoming galaxy redshift surveys (e.g. two- and three-point statistics). The construction of the catalogues shown in this paper is part of a mock-comparison project within the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) collaboration. We use the bias assignment method ( BAM ) to model the statistics of halo distribution through a learning algorithm using a few detailed N-body simulations, and approximated gravity solvers based on Lagrangian perturbation theory. We introduce cosmic-web-dependent corrections to modelling redshift-space distortions at the N-body level – both in the halo and galaxy distributions –, as well as a multi-scale approach for accurate assignment of halo properties. Using specific models of halo occupation distributions to populate halos, we generate galaxy mocks with the expected number density and central-satellite fraction of emission-line galaxies, which are a key target of the DESI experiment. BAM generates mock catalogues with per cent accuracy in a number of summary statistics, such as the abundance, the two- and three-point statistics of halo distributions, both in real and redshift space. In particular, the mock galaxy catalogues display ~3%-10% accuracy in the multipoles of the power spectrum up to scales of k ~ 0.4 h -1 Mpc. We show that covariance matrices of two- and three-point statistics obtained with BAM display a similar structure to the reference simulation. BAM offers an efficient way to produce mock halo catalogues with accurate two- and three-point statistics and is able to generate a variety of multi-tracer catalogues with precise covariance matrices of several cosmological probes. We discuss future developments of the algorithm towards mock production in DESI and other galaxy-redshift surveys.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
NASA NTRS1986

An observational view of large scale structure

A summary of recent observations of galaxy clustering is presented, including a brief review of redshift maps and galaxy clustering statistics. Simple arguments are presented that argue the underlying mass fluctuations are most likely associated with a clustering scale no larger than that of individual galaxies. The acceleration of the local group from the comoving frame of the universe and its connection to the microwave dipole anisotropy are also discussed. A final topic for consideration is the existence of large voids and clusters, and whether they are consistent with Gaussian initial conditions. The extreme size and depth of the Bootes void, if real, do present a puzzle. Finally, future directions for observational study of large scale structure are discussed.

Davis, Marc↗
DOE OSTI2023

Evidence for Suppression of Structure Growth in the Concordance Cosmological Model

We present evidence for a suppressed growth rate of large-scale structure during the dark-energy dominated era. Modeling the growth rate of perturbations with the ``growth index'' γ, we find that current cosmological data strongly prefer a higher growth index than the value γ=0.55 predicted by general relativity in a flat ΛCDM cosmology. Both the cosmic microwave background data from Planck and the large-scale structure data from weak lensing, galaxy clustering, and cosmic velocities separately favor growth suppression. When combined, they yield γ = 0.633$^{+0.025}_{–0.024}$, excluding γ = 0.55 at a statistical significance of 3.7σ. The combination of fσ8 and Planck measurements prefers an even higher growth index of γ = 0.639$^{+0.024}_{–0.025}$, corresponding to a 4.2σ-tension with the concordance model. In Planck data, the suppressed growth rate offsets the preference for nonzero curvature and fits the data equally well as the latter model. Furthermore, a higher γ leads to a higher matter fluctuation amplitude S 8 inferred from galaxy clustering and weak lensing measurements, and a lower S 8 from Planck data, effectively resolving the S 8 tension.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
NASA NTRS1987

The dynamics and evolution of clusters of galaxies

Research was undertaken to produce a coherent picture of the formation and evolution of large-scale structures in the universe. The program is divided into projects which examine four areas: the relationship between individual galaxies and their environment; the structure and evolution of individual rich clusters of galaxies; the nature of superclusters; and the large-scale distribution of individual galaxies. A brief review of results in each area is provided.

Geller, Margaret↗
DOE OSTI2024

The Atacama Cosmology Telescope: A Measurement of the DR6 CMB Lensing Power Spectrum and Its Implications for Structure Growth

We present new measurements of cosmic microwave background (CMB) lensing over 9400 deg of the sky. These lensing measurements are derived from the Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT) Data Release 6 (DR6) CMB data set, which consists of five seasons of ACT CMB temperature and polarization observations. We determine the amplitude of the CMB lensing power spectrum at 2.3% precision (43σ significance) using a novel pipeline that minimizes sensitivity to foregrounds and to noise properties. To ensure that our results are robust, we analyze an extensive set of null tests, consistency tests, and systematic error estimates and employ a blinded analysis framework. Our CMB lensing power spectrum measurement provides constraints on the amplitude of cosmic structure that do not depend on Planck or galaxy survey data, thus giving independent information about large-scale structure growth and potential tensions in structure measurements. The baseline spectrum is well fit by a lensing amplitude of A lens = 1.013 ± 0.023 relative to the Planck 2018 CMB power spectra best-fit ΛCDM model and A lens = 1.005 ± 0.023 relative to the ACT DR4 + WMAP best-fit model. From our lensing power spectrum measurement, we derive constraints on the parameter combination $S^{CMBL}_{8}$ ≡ σ 8 (Ω m /0.3) 0.25 of $S^{CMBL}_{8}$ = 0.818 ± 0.022 from ACT DR6 CMB lensing alone and $S^{CMBL}_{8}$ = 0.813 ± 0.018 when combining ACT DR6 and Planck NPIPE CMB lensing power spectra. These results are in excellent agreement with ΛCDM model constraints from Planck or ACT DR4 + WMAP CMB power spectrum measurements. Our lensing measurements from redshifts z ~ 0.5–5 are thus fully consistent with ΛCDM structure growth predictions based on CMB anisotropies probing primarily z ~ 1100. We find no evidence for a suppression of the amplitude of cosmic structure at low redshifts.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗