292 research outputs found
Rotational Widths for Use in the Tully-Fisher Relation. II. The Impact of Surface Brightness
Using a large sample of spiral galaxies for which 21 cm single-dish and/or
long-slit optical spectra are available, we make a detailed comparison between
various estimates of rotational widths. Different optical width estimators are
considered and their limitations discussed, with emphasis on biases associated
with rotation curve properties (shape and extent) and disk central surface
brightness. The best match with HI rotational velocities is obtained with
Polyex widths, which are measured at the optical radius (encompassing a fixed
fraction of the total light of the galaxy) from a model fit to the rotation
curve. In contrast with Polyex widths, optical rotational velocities measured
at 2.15 disk scale lengths r_d deviate from HI widths by an amount that
correlates with the central surface brightness of the disk. This bias occurs
because the rotation curves of galaxies are in general still rising at 2.15
r_d, and the fraction of total mass contained within this radius decreases with
increasing disk surface brightness. Statistical corrections, parameterized by
the radial extent of the observed rotation curve, are provided to reduce Polyex
and HI width measurements into a homogeneous system. This yields a single
robust estimate of rotational velocity to be used for applications of disk
scaling relations.Comment: 13 pages, 8 figures. To appear in the Astronomical Journal (August
2007
The GALEX Arecibo SDSS Survey. VI. Second Data Release and Updated Gas Fraction Scaling Relations
We present the second data release from the GALEX Arecibo SDSS Survey (GASS),
an ongoing large Arecibo program to measure the HI properties for an unbiased
sample of ~1000 galaxies with stellar masses greater than 10^10 Msun and
redshifts 0.025<z<0.05. GASS targets are selected from the Sloan Digital Sky
Survey (SDSS) spectroscopic and Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) imaging
surveys, and are observed until detected or until a gas mass fraction limit of
a few per cent is reached. This second data installment includes new Arecibo
observations of 240 galaxies, and marks the 50% of the complete survey. We
present catalogs of the HI, optical and ultraviolet parameters for these
galaxies, and their HI-line profiles. Having more than doubled the size of the
sample since the first data release, we also revisit the main scaling relations
of the HI mass fraction with galaxy stellar mass, stellar mass surface density,
concentration index, and NUV-r color, as well as the gas fraction plane
introduced in our earlier work.Comment: 30 pages, 12 figures. Accepted for publication in A&A. Version with
complete Appendix A available at http://www.mpa-garching.mpg.de/GASS/pubs.php
. GASS released data can be found at
http://www.mpa-garching.mpg.de/GASS/data.ph
The effect of the environment on the HI scaling relations
We use a volume-, magnitude-limited sample of nearby galaxies to investigate
the effect of the environment on the HI scaling relations. We confirm that the
HI-to-stellar mass ratio anti correlates with stellar mass, stellar mass
surface density and NUV-r colour across the whole range of parameters covered
by our sample (10^9 <M*<10^11 Msol, 7.5 <mu*<9.5 Msol kpc^-2, 2<NUV-r<6 mag).
These scaling relations are also followed by galaxies in the Virgo cluster,
although they are significantly offset towards lower gas content.
Interestingly, the difference between field and cluster galaxies gradually
decreases moving towards massive, bulge-dominated systems. By comparing our
data with the predictions of chemo-spectrophotometric models of galaxy
evolution, we show that starvation alone cannot explain the low gas content of
Virgo spirals and that only ram-pressure stripping is able to reproduce our
findings. Finally, motivated by previous studies, we investigate the use of a
plane obtained from the relations between the HI-to-stellar mass ratio, stellar
mass surface density and NUV-r colour as a proxy for the HI deficiency
parameter. We show that the distance from the `HI gas fraction plane' can be
used as an alternative estimate for the HI deficiency, but only if carefully
calibrated on pre-defined samples of `unperturbed' systems.Comment: Accepted for publication on MNRAS main journal. 11 pages, 6 figures,
1 tabl
xGASS: gas-rich central galaxies in small groups and their connections to cosmic web gas feeding
We use deep H I observations obtained as part of the extended GALEX Arecibo SDSS survey (xGASS) to study the cold gas properties of central galaxies across environments. We find that below stellar masses of 1010.2 M⊙, central galaxies in groups have an average atomic hydrogen gas fraction ∼0.3 dex higher than those in isolation at the same stellar mass. At these stellar masses, group central galaxies are usually found in small groups of N = 2 members. The higher H I content in these low-mass group central galaxies is mirrored by their higher average star formation activity and molecular hydrogen content. At larger stellar masses, this difference disappears and central galaxies in groups have similar (or even smaller) gas reservoirs and star formation activity compared to those in isolation. We discuss possible scenarios able to explain our findings and suggest that the higher gas content in low-mass group central galaxies is likely due to the contributions from the cosmic web or H I-rich minor mergers, which also fuel their enhanced star formation activity
The velocity function in the local environment from LCDM and LWDM constrained simulations
Using constrained simulations of the local Universe for generic cold dark
matter and for 1keV warm dark matter, we investigate the difference in the
abundance of dark matter halos in the local environment. We find that the mass
function within 20 Mpc/h of the Local Group is ~2 times larger than the
universal mass function in the 10^9-10^13 M_odot/h mass range. Imposing the
field of view of the on-going HI blind survey ALFALFA in our simulations, we
predict that the velocity function in the Virgo-direction region exceeds the
universal velocity function by a factor of 3. Furthermore, employing a scheme
to translate the halo velocity function into a galaxy velocity function, we
compare the simulation results with a sample of galaxies from the early catalog
release of ALFALFA. We find that our simulations are able to reproduce the
velocity function in the 80-300 km/s velocity range, having a value ~10 times
larger than the universal velocity function in the Virgo-direction region. In
the low velocity regime, 35-80 km/s, the warm dark matter simulation reproduces
the observed flattening of the velocity function. On the contrary, the
simulation with cold dark matter predicts a steep rise in the velocity function
towards lower velocities; for V_max=35 km/s, it forecasts ~10 times more
sources than the ones observed. If confirmed by the complete ALFALFA survey,
our results indicate a potential problem for the cold dark matter paradigm or
for the conventional assumptions about energetic feedback in dwarf galaxies.Comment: 24 pages, 14 figures, 1 table, accepted for publication in Ap
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