177 research outputs found
GOODS-Herschel: star formation, dust attenuation, and the FIR-radio correlation on the main sequence of star-forming galaxies up to z=4
We use deep panchromatic data sets in the GOODS-N field, from GALEX to the deepest Herschel far-infrared (FIR) and VLA radio continuum imaging, to explore the evolution of star-formation activity and dust attenuation properties of star-forming galaxies to z sime 4, using mass-complete samples. Our main results can be summarized as follows: (i) the slope of the star-formation rate–M* correlation is consistent with being constant sime0.8 up to z sime 1.5, while its normalization keeps increasing with redshift; (ii) for the first time we are able to explore the FIR–radio correlation for a mass-selected sample of star-forming galaxies: the correlation does not evolve up to z sime 4; (iii) we confirm that galaxy stellar mass is a robust proxy for UV dust attenuation in star-forming galaxies, with more massive galaxies being more dust attenuated. Strikingly, we find that this attenuation relation evolves very weakly with redshift, with the amount of dust attenuation increasing by less than 0.3 mag over the redshift range [0.5–4] for a fixed stellar mass; (iv) the correlation between dust attenuation and the UV spectral slope evolves with redshift, with the median UV slope becoming bluer with redshift. By z sime 3, typical UV slopes are inconsistent, given the measured dust attenuations, with the predictions of commonly used empirical laws. (v) Finally, building on existing results, we show that gas reddening is marginally larger (by a factor of around 1.3) than the stellar reddening at all redshifts probed. Our results support a scenario where the ISM conditions of typical star-forming galaxies evolve with redshift, such that at z ≥ 1.5 Main Sequence galaxies have ISM conditions moving closer to those of local starbursts
Radio galaxy feedback in X-ray selected groups from COSMOS: the effect on the ICM
We quantify the importance of the mechanical energy released by
radio-galaxies inside galaxy groups. We use scaling relations to estimate the
mechanical energy released by 16 radio-AGN located inside X-ray detected galaxy
groups in the COSMOS field. By comparing this energy output to the host groups'
gravitational binding energy, we find that radio galaxies produce sufficient
energy to unbind a significant fraction of the intra-group medium. This
unbinding effect is negligible in massive galaxy clusters with deeper potential
wells. Our results correctly reproduce the breaking of self-similarity observed
in the scaling relation between entropy and temperature for galaxy groups.Comment: Accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal. 12 Page
The near-infrared luminosity function of cluster galaxies beyond redshift one
We determined the K band luminosity function (LF) of cluster galaxies at
redshift z~1.2, using near-infrared images of three X-ray luminous clusters at
z=1.11,1.24,1.27. The composite LF was derived down to M*+4, by means of
statistical background subtraction, and is well described by a Schechter
function with K*=20.5 AB mag and alpha=-1.
From the K band composite LF we derived the stellar mass function of cluster
galaxies. Using available X-ray mass profiles we determined the M/L ratios of
these three clusters, which tend to be lower than those measured in the local
universe.
With these data, no significant difference can be seen between the shapes of
the cluster galaxies LF and the LF of field galaxies at similar redshift.
We also found no significant evolution out to z ~1.2 in the bright (<M*+4)
part of the cluster galaxies LF probed in this study, apart from a brightening
of ~1.3 mag of the characteristic magnitude of the high redshift LF. We
confirm, and extend to higher redshift, the result from previous work that the
redshift evolution of the characteristic magnitude M* is consistent with
passive evolution of a stellar population formed at z>2.
The results obtained in this work support and extend previous findings that
most of the stars in bright galaxies were formed at high redshift, and that
K-bright (M>10^11 Msun) galaxies were already in place at z ~ 1.2, at least in
the central regions of X-ray luminous clusters. Together with recent results on
the field galaxies stellar mass function, this implies that most of the stellar
mass is already assembled in massive galaxies by z ~ 1, both in low and high
density environments.Comment: 16 pages, 10 figures, to appear in A&
SDSS-IV MaNGA : constraints on the conditions for star formation in galaxy discs
Funding: Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellowship (AW)Regions of disc galaxies with widespread star formation tend to be both gravitationally unstable and self-shielded against ionizing radiation, whereas extended outer discs with little or no star formation tend to be stable and unshielded on average. We explore what drives the transition between these two regimes, specifically whether discs first meet the conditions for self-shielding (parameterized by dust optical depth, τ) or gravitational instability (parameterized by a modified version of Toomre’s instability parameters, Qthermal, which quantifies the stability of a gas disc that is thermally supported at T = 104 K). We first introduce a new metric formed by the product of these quantities, Qthermalτ, which indicates whether the conditions for disk instability or self-shielding are easier to meet in a given region of a galaxy, and we discuss how Qthermalτ can be constrained even in the absence of direct gas information. We then analyse a sample of 13 galaxies with resolved gas measurements and find that on average galaxies will reach the threshold for disk instabilities (Qthermal 1). Using integral field spectroscopic observations of a sample of 236 galaxies from the MaNGA survey, we find that the value of Qthermalτ in star-forming discs is consistent with similar behavior. These results support a scenario where disc fragmentation and collapse occurs before self-shielding, suggesting that gravitational instabilities are the primary condition for widespread star formation in galaxy discs. Our results support similar conclusions based on recent galaxy simulations.PostprintPeer reviewe
The SWIRE-VVDS-CFHTLS surveys: stellar mass assembly over the last 10 Gyears. Evidence for a major build up of the red sequence between z=2 and z=1
(abridged abstract) We present an analysis of the stellar mass growth over
the last 10 Gyrs using a large 3.6 selected sample. We split our sample
into active (blue) and quiescent (red) galaxies. Our measurements of the K-LFs
and LD evolution support the idea that a large fraction of galaxies is already
assembled at . Based on the analysis of the evolution of the stellar
mass-to-light ratio (in K-band) for the spectroscopic sub-sample, we derive the
stellar mass density for the entire sample. We find that the global evolution
of the stellar mass density is well reproduced by the star formation rate
derived from UV dust corrected measurements. Over the last 8Gyrs, we observe
that the stellar mass density of the active population remains approximately
constant while it gradually increases for the quiescent population over the
same timescale. As a consequence, the growth of the stellar mass in the
quiescent population must be due to the shutoff of star formation in active
galaxies that migrate into the quiescent population. From to , we
observe a major build-up of the quiescent population with an increase by a
factor of 10 in stellar mass, suggesting that we are observing the epoch when
an increasing fraction of galaxies are ending their star formation activity and
start to build up the red sequence.Comment: Accepted to A&A with major changes. 1 table and 13 figure
The VIMOS VLT Deep Survey. The Assembly History of the Stellar Mass in Galaxies: from the Young to the Old Universe
We present a detailed analysis of the Galaxy Stellar Mass Function of
galaxies up to z=2.5 as obtained from the VVDS. We estimate the stellar mass
from broad-band photometry using 2 different assumptions on the galaxy star
formation history and show that the addition of secondary bursts to a
continuous star formation history produces systematically higher (up to 40%)
stellar masses. At low redshift (z=0.2) we find a substantial population of
low-mass galaxies (<10^9 Msun) composed by faint blue galaxies (M_I-M_K=0.3).
In general the stellar mass function evolves slowly up to z=0.9 and more
significantly above this redshift. Conversely, a massive tail is present up to
z=2.5 and have extremely red colours (M_I-M_K=0.7-0.8). We find a decline with
redshift of the overall number density of galaxies for all masses (59+-5% for
M>10^8 Msun at z=1), and a mild mass-dependent average evolution
(`mass-downsizing'). In particular our data are consistent with mild/negligible
(6x10^10 Msun). For less
massive systems the no-evolution scenario is excluded. A large fraction (>=50%)
of massive galaxies have been already assembled and converted most of their gas
into stars at z=1, ruling out the `dry mergers' as the major mechanism of their
assembly history below z=1. This fraction decreases to 33% at z=2. Low-mass
systems have decreased continuously in number and mass density (by a factor up
to 4) from the present age to z=2, consistently with a prolonged mass assembly
also at z<1.Comment: 20 pages with 12 encapsulated figures. Version accepted by A&
Predicting functional impairment trajectories in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis: a probabilistic, multifactorial model of disease progression.
To employ Artificial Intelligence to model, predict and simulate the amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) progression over time in terms of variable interactions, functional impairments, and survival. We employed demographic and clinical variables, including functional scores and the utilisation of support interventions, of 3940 ALS patients from four Italian and two Israeli registers to develop a new approach based on Dynamic Bayesian Networks (DBNs) that models the ALS evolution over time, in two distinct scenarios of variable availability. The method allows to simulate patients' disease trajectories and predict the probability of functional impairment and survival at different time points. DBNs explicitly represent the relationships between the variables and the pathways along which they influence the disease progression. Several notable inter-dependencies were identified and validated by comparison with literature. Moreover, the implemented tool allows the assessment of the effect of different markers on the disease course, reproducing the probabilistically expected clinical progressions. The tool shows high concordance in terms of predicted and real prognosis, assessed as time to functional impairments and survival (integral of the AU-ROC in the first 36 months between 0.80-0.93 and 0.84-0.89 for the two scenarios, respectively). Provided only with measurements commonly collected during the first visit, our models can predict time to the loss of independence in walking, breathing, swallowing, communicating, and survival and it can be used to generate in silico patient cohorts with specific characteristics. Our tool provides a comprehensive framework to support physicians in treatment planning and clinical decision-making. [Abstract copyright: © 2022. The Author(s).
Ages and Metallicities of Extragalactic Globular Clusters from Spectral and Photometric Fits of Stellar Population Synthesis Models
Spectra of galaxies contain an enormous amount of information about the
relative mixture of ages and metallicities of constituent stars. We present a
comprehensive study designed to extract the maximum information from spectra of
data quality typical in large galaxy surveys. We test fitting techniques using
the Bruzual-Charlot 2003 high resolution simple stellar population synthesis
models to simultaneously estimate the ages and metallicities of 101 globular
clusters in M31 and the Magellanic Clouds. The clusters cover a wide range of
ages and metallicities, 4 Myr to 20 Gyr and -1.6 < [Fe/H] < +0.3, estimated by
other methods in the literature. We compare results from model fits to both the
spectra and photometry and find that fits to continuum-normalized (CN) spectra
over the entire range available, typically 350-1000 nm for this sample,
provides the best results. For clusters older than 1 Gyr we agree with
literature ages to 0.16 dex (35%) and [Fe/H] to 0.12 dex. For younger clusters
we agree with literature ages to 0.3 dex (63%), but cannot constrain the
metallicity. It is particularly important to use the entire CN spectrum to
avoid problems with model continua for young objects and to break
age-metallicity degeneracies of broadband photometry. Our required S/N = 15-30
for 20% age uncertainties and 30-55 for 10% uncertainties over spectral
resolutions of 5-25 Angstroms. This technique should work well for the
age-metallicity parameter space expected for early-type galaxies at z~1,
although individual galaxy spectral S/N may require the coaddition of a few
like objects.Comment: 70 pages, 18 figures, ApJ, in pres
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