740 research outputs found
Galaxy And Mass Assembly (GAMA) blended spectra catalogue: strong galaxy-galaxy lens and occulting galaxy pair candidates
We present the catalogue of blended galaxy spectra from the Galaxy And Mass Assembly (GAMA) survey. These are cases where light from two galaxies are significantly detected in a single GAMA fibre. Galaxy pairs identified from their blended spectrum fall into two principal classes: they are either strong lenses, a passive galaxy lensing an emission-line galaxy; or occulting galaxies, serendipitous overlaps of two galaxies, of any type. Blended spectra can thus be used to reliably identify strong lenses for follow-up observations (high-resolution imaging) and occulting pairs, especially those that are a late-type partly obscuring an early-type galaxy which are of interest for the study of dust content of spiral and irregular galaxies. The GAMA survey setup and its AUTOZ automated redshift determination were used to identify candidate blended galaxy spectra from the cross-correlation peaks. We identify 280 blended spectra with a minimum velocity separation of 600 km s−1, of which 104 are lens pair candidates, 71 emission-line-passive pairs, 78 are pairs of emission-line galaxies and 27 are pairs of galaxies with passive spectra. We have visually inspected the candidates in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) and Kilo Degree Survey (KiDS) images. Many blended objects are ellipticals with blue fuzz (Ef in our classification). These latter ‘Ef’ classifications are candidates for possible strong lenses, massive ellipticals with an emission-line galaxy in one or more lensed images. The GAMA lens and occulting galaxy candidate samples are similar in size to those identified in the entire SDSS. This blended spectrum sample stands as a testament of the power of this highly complete, second-largest spectroscopic survey in existence and offers the possibility to expand e.g. strong gravitational lens surveys
Quantified Morphology of HI Disks in the Universe
he upcoming new perspective of the high redshift Universe in the 21 cm line
of atomic hydrogen opens possibilities to explore topics of spiral disk
evolution, hitherto reserved for the optical regime. The growth of spiral gas
disks over Cosmic time can be explored with the new generation of radio
telescopes, notably the SKA, and its precursors, as accurately as with the
Hubble Space Telescope for stellar disks. Since the atomic hydrogen gas is the
building block of these disks, it should trace their formation accurately.
Morphology of HI disks can now equally be quantified over Cosmic time. In
studies of HST deep fields, the optical or UV morphology of high-redshift
galaxy disks have been characterized using a few quantities: concentration (C),
asymmetry (A), smoothness (S), second-order-moment (M20), the GINI coefficient
(G), and Ellipticity (E). We have applied these parameters across wavelengths
and compared them to the HI morphology over the THINGS sample. NGC 3184, an
unperturbed disk, and NGC 5194, the canonical 3:1 interaction, serve as
examples for quantified morphology. We find that morphology parameters
determined in HI are as good or better a tracer of interaction compared to
those in any other wavelength, notably in Asymmetry, Gini and M20. This opens
the possibility of using them in the parameterization pipeline for SKA
precursor catalogues to select interacting or harassed galaxies from their HI
morphology. Asymmetry, Gini and M20 may be redefined for use on data-cubes
rather than HI column density image.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures, proceeding of the conference "Panoramic Radio
Astronomy: Wide-field 1-2 GHz research on galaxy evolution", June 02 - 05
2009, Groningen, update after small edit
Quantified HI Morphology V: HI Disks in the Virgo Cluster
We explore the quantified morphology of atomic hydrogen (HI) disks in the
Virgo cluster. These galaxies display a wealth of phenomena in their Hi
morphology, e.g., tails, truncation and warps. These morphological disturbances
are related to the ram-pressure stripping and tidal interaction that galaxies
undergo in this dense cluster environment. To quantify the morphological
transformation of the HI disks, we compute the morphological parameters of CAS,
Gini, and M20 and our own GM for 51 galaxies in 48 HI column density maps from
the VIVA project. Some morphological phenomena can be identified in this space
of relatively low resolution HI data. Truncation of the HI disk can be cleanly
identified via the Concentration parameter (C<1) and Concentration can also be
used to identify HI deficient disks (1<C<5). Tidal interaction is typically
identified using combinations of these morphological parameters, applied to
(optical) images of galaxies. We find that some selection criteria (Gini-M20,
Asymmetry, and a modified Concentration-M20) are still applicable for the
coarse (~15" FWHM) VIVA HI data. The phenomena of tidal tails can be reasonably
well identified using the Gini-M20 criterion (60% of galaxies with tails
identified but with as many contaminants). Ram-pressure does move HI disks into
and out of most of our interaction criteria: the ram-pressure sequence
identified by Vollmer et al. (2009) tracks into and out of some of these
criteria (Asymmetry based and the Gini-M20 selections, but not the
Concentration-M20 or the GM based ones). Therefore, future searches for
interaction using HI morphologies should take ram-pressure into account as a
mechanism to disturb HI disks enough to make them appear as gravitationally
interacting. One mechanism would be to remove all the HI deficient (C<5) disks
from the sample, as these have undergone more than one HI removal mechanism.Comment: 10 pages, 3 figures, accepted by MNRAS, appendixes not include
All NIRspec needs is HST/WFC3 pre-imaging? The use of Milky Way Stars in WFC3 Imaging to Register NIRspec MSA Observations
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will be an exquisite new near-infrared
observatory with imaging and multi-object spectroscopy through ESA's NIRspec
instrument with its unique Micro-Shutter Array (MSA), allowing for slits to be
positioned on astronomical targets by opening specific 0.002"-wide micro
shutter doors.
To ensure proper target acquisition, the on-sky position of the MSA needs to
be verified before spectroscopic observations start. An onboard centroiding
program registers the position of pre-identified guide stars in a Target
Acquisition (TA) image, a short pre-spectroscopy exposure without dispersion
(image mode) through the MSA with all shutters open.
The outstanding issue is the availability of Galactic stars in the right
luminosity range for TA relative to typical high redshift targets. We explore
this here using the stars and candidate galaxies identified in the
source extractor catalogs of Brightest of Reionizing Galaxies survey
(BoRG[z8]), a pure-parallel program with Hubble Space Telescope Wide-Field
Camera 3.
We find that (a) a single WFC3 field contains enough Galactic stars to
satisfy the NIRspec astrometry requirement (20 milli-arcseconds), provided its
and the NIRspec TA's are AB in WFC3 F125W, (b) a single WFC3
image can therefore serve as the pre-image if need be, (c) a WFC3 mosaic and
accompanying TA image satisfy the astrometry requirement at AB mag in
WFC3 F125W, (d) no specific Galactic latitude requires deeper TA imaging due to
a lack of Galactic stars, and (e) a depth of AB mag in WFC3 F125W is
needed if a guide star in the same MSA quadrant as a target is required.
We take the example of a BoRG identified candidate galaxy and
require a Galactic star within 20" of it. In this case, a depth of 25.5 AB in
F125W is required (with 97% confidence).Comment: 17 pages, 15 figures, to appear in the Journal of Astronomical
Instrumentatio
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