We present an extended version of the spectral synthesis code starlight designed to incorporate both λ-by-λ spectra and photometric fluxes in the estimation of stellar population properties of ...galaxies. The code is tested with simulations and data for 260 galaxies culled from the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field Area (CALIFA) survey, spatially matching the 3700–7000 Å optical data cubes to Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) near-ultraviolet (NUV) and far-ultraviolet (FUV) images. The sample spans E–Sd galaxies with masses from 109 to 1012 M⊙ and stellar populations all the way from star-forming to old, passive systems. Comparing results derived from purely optical fits with those which also consider the NUV and FUV data we find that the following. (1) The new code is capable of matching the input ultraviolet (UV) data within the errors while keeping the quality of the optical fit essentially unchanged. (2) Despite being unreliable predictors of the UV fluxes, purely optical fits yield stellar population properties which agree well with those obtained in optical+UV fits for nearly 90 per cent of our sample. (3) The addition of UV constraints has little impact on properties such as stellar mass and dust optical depth. Mean stellar ages and metallicities also remain nearly the same for most galaxies, the exception being low-mass, late-type galaxies, which become older and less enriched due to rearrangements of their youngest populations. (4) The revised ages are better correlated with observables such as the 4000 Å break index, and the NUV − r and u − r colours, an empirical indication that the addition of UV constraints helps mitigating the effects of age–metallicity–extinction degeneracies.
Context.
The present study addresses a key question related to our understanding of the relation between void galaxies and their environment: the relationship between luminous and dark matter in and ...around voids.
Aims.
To explore the extent to which local Universe voids are empty of matter, we study the full (dark+luminous) matter content of seven nearby cosmic voids that are fully contained within the CosmicFlows-3 volume.
Methods.
We obtained the matter-density profiles of seven cosmic voids using two independent methods. These were built from the galaxy redshift space two-point correlation function in conjunction with peculiar velocity gradients from the CosmicFlows-3 dataset.
Results.
The results are striking, because when the redshift survey is used, all voids show a radial positive gradient of galaxies, while based on the dynamical analysis, only three of these voids display a clear underdensity of matter in their center.
Conclusions.
This work constitutes the most detailed observational analysis of voids conducted so far, and shows that void emptiness should be derived from dynamical information. From this limited study, the Hercules void appears to be the best candidate for a local Universe pure “pristine volume”, expanding in three directions with no dark matter located in that void.
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We present a detailed auto-consistent study of the nearest blue compact dwarf galaxy NGC 6789 by means of optical and ultraviolet (UV) archive photometry data and optical long-slit Intermediate ...dispersion Spectrograph and Imaging System-William Herschel Telescope (WHT) spectroscopy observations of the five brightest star-forming knots. The analysis of the spectra in all knots allowed the derivation of ionic chemical abundances of oxygen, nitrogen, sulphur, argon and neon using measures of both the high- and low-excitation electron temperatures, leading to the conclusion that NGC 6789 is chemically homogeneous with low values of the abundance of oxygen in the range 12+log(O/H) = 7.80-7.93, but presenting at the same time higher values of the nitrogen-to-oxygen ratio than expected for its metal regime.
We used archival Hubble Space Telescope/Wide-Field Planetary Camera 2 (HST/WFPC2) F555W and F814W observations of NGC 6789 to perform a photometric study of the colour-magnitude diagram (CMD) of the resolved stellar populations and derive its star formation history (SFH), which is compatible with the presence of different young and old stellar populations whose metallicities do not necessarily increase with age. We fit the observed optical spectrum in all the five knots using the starlight code and a combination of single stellar populations following the SFH obtained from the CMD. We compare the resulting stellar masses and the relative fractions of the ionizing populations with a non-constrained SFH case. The properties of the younger populations were obtained using cloudy photoionization models, giving similar ages in all the knots in the range 3-6 Myr and the estimation of the dust absorption factor, which correlates with the observed GALEX far-ultraviolet-near-ultraviolet colour indices. The total photometric extinction and dust-absorption corrected Hα fluxes were finally used to derive the star formation rates.
We present the first public data release (DR1) of the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field Area (CALIFA) survey. It consists of science-grade optical datacubes for the first 100 of eventually 600 nearby ...galaxies, obtained with the integral-field spectrograph PMAS/PPak mounted on the 3.5 m telescope at the Calar Alto observatory. The galaxies in DR1 already cover a wide range of properties in color-magnitude space, morphological type, stellar mass, and gas ionization conditions. Two different spectral setups are available for each galaxy, (i) a low-resolution V500 setup covering the nominal wavelength range 3745-7500 Angstrom with a spectral resolution of 6.0 Angstrom (FWHM), and (ii) a medium-resolution V1200 setup covering the nominal wavelength range 3650-4840 Angstrom with a spectral resolution of 2.3 Angstrom (FWHM). We present the characteristics and data structure of the CALIFA datasets that should be taken into account for scientific exploitation of the data, in particular the effects of vignetting, bad pixels and spatially correlated noise.
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This paper presents the spatially resolved star formation history (2D-SFH) of a small sample of four local mergers: the early-stage mergers IC 1623, NGC 6090, and the Mice, and the more advanced ...merger NGC 2623, by analyzing IFS data from the CALIFA survey and PMAS in LArr mode. Full spectral fitting techniques are applied to the datacubes to obtain the spatially resolved mass growth histories, the time evolution of the star formation rate intensity (Σ
SFR
), and the local specific star formation rate (sSFR), over three different time scales (30 Myr, 300 Myr, and 1 Gyr). The results are compared with non-interacting Sbc–Sc galaxies, to quantify if there is an enhancement of the star formation and to trace its time scale and spatial extent. Our results for the three LIRGs (IC 1623 W, NGC 6090, and NGC 2623) show that a major phase of star formation is occurring in time scales of 10
7
yr to few 10
8
yr, with global SFR enhancements of between approximately two and six with respect to main-sequence star forming (MSSF) galaxies. In the two early-stage mergers IC 1623 W and NGC 6090, which are between first pericentre passage and coalescence, the most remarkable increase of the SFR with respect to non-interacting spirals occurred in the last 30 Myr, and it is spatially extended, with enhancements of factors between two and seven both in the centres (
r
< 0.5 half light radius, HLR), and in the disks (
r
> 1 HLR). In the more advanced merger NGC 2623 an extended phase of star formation occurred on a longer time scale of ~1 Gyr, with a SFR enhancement of a factor of approximately two-to-three larger than the one in Sbc–Sc MSSF galaxies over the same period, probably relic of the first pericentre passage epoch. A SFR enhancement in the last 30 Myr is also present, but only in NGC 2623 centre, by a factor of three. In general, the spatially resolved SFHs of the LIRG-mergers are consistent with the predictions from high spatial resolution simulations. In contrast, the star formation in the Mice, specially in Mice B, is not enhanced but inhibited with respect to Sbc–Sc MSSF galaxies. The fact that the gas fraction of Mice B is smaller than in most non-interacting spirals, and that the Mice are close to a prograde orbit, represents a new challenge for the models, which must cover a larger space of parameters in terms of the availability of gas and the orbital characteristics.
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Spiral arms are the most singular features in disc galaxies. These structures can exhibit different patterns, namely grand design and flocculent arms, with easily distinguishable characteristics. ...However, their origin and the mechanisms shaping them are unclear. The overall role of spirals in the chemical evolution of disc galaxies is another unsolved question. In particular, it has not been fully explored if the H ii regions of spiral arms present different properties from those located in the interarm regions. Here we analyse the radial oxygen abundance gradient of the arm and interarm star forming regions of 63 face-on spiral galaxies using CALIFA Integral Field Spectroscopy data. We focus the analysis on three characteristic parameters of the profile: slope, zero-point, and scatter. The sample is morphologically separated into flocculent versus grand design spirals and barred versus unbarred galaxies. We find subtle but statistically significant differences betweenthe arm and interarm distributions for flocculent galaxies, suggesting that the mechanisms generating the spiral structure in these galaxies may be different to those producing grand design systems, for which no significant differences are found. We also find small differences in barred galaxies, not observed in unbarred systems, hinting that bars may affect the chemical distribution of these galaxies but not strongly enough as to be reflected in the overall abundance distribution. In light of these results, we propose bars and flocculent structure as two distinct mechanisms inducing differences in the abundance distribution between arm and interarm star forming regions.
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Context. According to numerical simulations, stars are not always kept at their birth galactocentric distances but they have a tendency to migrate. The importance of this radial migration in shaping ...galactic light distributions is still unclear. However, if radial migration is indeed important, galaxies with different surface brightness (SB) profiles must display differences in their stellar population properties. Aims. We investigate the role of radial migration in the light distribution and radial stellar content by comparing the inner colour, age, and metallicity gradients for galaxies with different SB profiles. We define these inner parts, avoiding the bulge and bar regions and up to around three disc scale lengths (type I, pure exponential) or the break radius (type II, downbending; type III, upbending). Methods. We analysed 214 spiral galaxies from the CALIFA survey covering different SB profiles. We made use of GASP2D and SDSS data to characterise the light distribution and obtain colour profiles of these spiral galaxies. The stellar age and metallicity profiles were computed using a methodology based on full-spectrum fitting techniques (pPXF, GANDALF, and STECKMAP) to the Integral Field Spectroscopic CALIFA data. Results. The distributions of the colour, stellar age, and stellar metallicity gradients in the inner parts for galaxies displaying different SB profiles are unalike as suggested by Kolmogorov-Smirnov and Anderson-Darling tests. We find a trend in which type II galaxies show the steepest profiles of all, type III show the shallowest, and type I display an intermediate behaviour. Conclusions. These results are consistent with a scenario in which radial migration is more efficient for type III galaxies than for type I systems, where type II galaxies present the lowest radial migration efficiency. In such a scenario, radial migration mixes the stellar content, thereby flattening the radial stellar properties and shaping different SB profiles. However, in light of these results we cannot further quantify the importance of radial migration in shaping spiral galaxies, and other processes, such as recent star formation or satellite accretion, might play a role.
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While studies of gas-phase metallicity gradients in disc galaxies are common, very little has been done towards the acquisition of stellar abundance gradients in the same regions. We present here a ...comparative study of the stellar metallicity and age distributions in a sample of 62 nearly face-on, spiral galaxies with and without bars, using data from the CALIFA survey. We measure the slopes of the gradients and study their relation with other properties of the galaxies. We find that the mean stellar age and metallicity gradients in the disc are shallow and negative. Furthermore, when normalized to the effective radius of the disc, the slope of the stellar population gradients does not correlate with the mass or with the morphological type of the galaxies. In contrast to this, the values of both age and metallicity at ~2.5 scale lengths correlate with the central velocity dispersion in a similar manner to the central values of the bulges, although bulges show, on average, older ages and higher metallicities than the discs. One of the goals of the present paper is to test the theoretical prediction that non-linear coupling between the bar and the spiral arms is an efficient mechanism for producing radial migrations across significant distances within discs. The process of radial migration should flatten the stellar metallicity gradient with time and, therefore, we would expect flatter stellar metallicity gradients in barred galaxies. However, we do not find any difference in the metallicity or age gradients between galaxies with and without bars. We discuss possible scenarios that can lead to this lack of difference.
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Integral field spectroscopy obtained with the Potsdam Multi-Aperture Spectrophotometer Fiber Package (PPak) and the 3.5-m telescope at the Calar Alto Observatory has been used to study an outer H ii ...region complex in the well-studied galaxy NGC 6946. This technique provides detailed maps of the region in different emission lines, yielding spatially resolved information about the physical properties of the gas. The configuration was chosen to cover the whole spectrum from 3600 up to 10 000 Å, allowing the measurement of the near-infrared S iii lines. We selected four luminous knots to perform a detailed integrated spectroscopic analysis of these structures and of the whole PPak field of view (FOV). For all the knots the electron density has been found to be very similar and below 100 cm−3. The O iii electron temperature was measured in knots A, B, C and in the integrated PPak field, and was found to be around 8000 K. The temperatures of O ii and S iii were estimated in the four cases. The elemental abundances computed from the ‘direct method’ are typical of high-metallicity disc H ii regions, with a mean value of 12+log(O/H) = 8.65, comparable to what has been found in this galaxy by other authors for regions at similar galactocentric distance. Therefore a remarkable abundance uniformity is found despite the different excitations found throughout the nebula. However, due to the quality of the data, the electron temperatures and metallicities obtained have associated errors comparable to the typical dispersion found in empirical calibrations. Wolf–Rayet (WR) features have been detected in three of the knots, leading to a derived total number of WR stars of 125, 22 and 5 for knots A, C and B, respectively. The ratios of the numbers of WR to O stars are consistent with the prediction of Starburst99 for individual bursts with an age about 4 Myr. Knot D, with no WR features, shows weak Hα emission, low excitation and the lowest Hβ equivalent width, all of which points to a more evolved state. The integrated spectrum of the whole PPak FOV shows high excitation and a relatively evolved age that does not correspond to the individual knot evolutionary stages. Some effects associated with the loss of spatial resolution are also evidenced by the higher ionizing temperature that is deduced from the η′ parameter measured in the integrated PPak spectrum with respect to that of the individual knots.
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