20 research outputs found
Internal kinematics of modelled interacting disc galaxies
We present an investigation of galaxy-galaxy interactions and their effects
on the velocity fields of disc galaxies in combined N-body/hydrodynamic
simulations, which include cooling, star formation with feedback, and galactic
winds. Rotation curves (RCs) of the gas are extracted from these simulations in
a way that follows the procedure applied to observations of distant, small, and
faint galaxies as closely as possible. We show that galaxy-galaxy mergers and
fly-bys disturb the velocity fields significantly and hence the RCs of the
interacting galaxies, leading to asymmetries and distortions in the RCs.
Typical features of disturbed kinematics are significantly rising or falling
profiles in the direction of the companion galaxy and pronounced bumps in the
RCs. In addition, tidal tails can leave strong imprints on the rotation curve.
All these features are observable for intermediate redshift galaxies, on which
we focus our investigations. We use a quantitative measure for the asymmetry of
rotation curves to show that the appearance of these distortions strongly
depends on the viewing angle. We also find in this way that the velocity fields
settle back into relatively undisturbed equilibrium states after unequal mass
mergers and fly-bys. About 1 Gyr after the first encounter, the RCs show no
severe distortions anymore. These results are consistent with previous
theoretical and observational studies. As an illustration of our results, we
compare our simulated velocity fields and direct images with rotation curves
from VLT/FORS spectroscopy and ACS images of a cluster at z=0.53 and find
remarkable similarities.Comment: 13 pages, 14 figures, accepted for publication in A&A, some
improvements and changes, main conclusions are unaffecte
Internal kinematics of spiral galaxies in distant clusters III. Velocity fields from FORS2/MXU spectroscopy
(Abridged) We study the impact of cluster environment on the evolution of
spiral galaxies by examining their structure and kinematics. Rather than
two-dimensional rotation curves, we observe complete velocity fields by placing
three adjacent and parallel FORS2 MXU slits on each object, yielding several
emission and absorption lines. The gas velocity fields are reconstructed and
decomposed into circular rotation and irregular motions using kinemetry. To
quantify irregularities in the gas kinematics, we define three parameters:
sigma_{PA} (standard deviation of the kinematic position angle), Delta phi (the
average misalignment between kinematic and photometric position angles) and
k_{3,5} (squared sum of the higher order Fourier terms). Using local,
undistorted galaxies from SINGS, these can be used to establish the regularity
of the gas velocity fields. Here we present the analysis of 22 distant galaxies
in the MS0451.6-0305 field with 11 members at z=0.54. In this sample we find
both field (4 out of 8) and cluster (3 out of 4) galaxies with velocity fields
that are both irregular and asymmetric. We show that these fractions are
underestimates of the actual number of galaxies with irregular velocity fields.
The values of the (ir)regularity parameters for cluster galaxies are not very
different from those of the field galaxies, implying that there are isolated
field galaxies that are as distorted as the cluster members. None of the
deviations in our small sample correlate with photometric/structural properties
like luminosity or disk scale length in a significant way.
Our 3D-spectroscopic method successfully maps the velocity field of distant
galaxies, enabling the importance and efficiency of cluster specific
interactions to be assessed quantitatively.Comment: accepted for publication in A&A, high resolution version available at
http://www.astro.rug.nl/~kutdemir/papers
Internal kinematics of spiral galaxies in distant clusters IV. Gas kinematics of spiral galaxies in intermediate redshift clusters and in the field
(Abridged) We trace the interaction processes of galaxies at intermediate
redshift by measuring the irregularity of their ionized gas kinematics, and
investigate these irregularities as a function of the environment (cluster
versus field) and of morphological type (spiral versus irregular). Our sample
consists of 92 distant galaxies. 16 cluster (z~0.3 and z~0.5) and 29 field
galaxies (mean z=0.44) of these have velocity fields with sufficient signal to
be analyzed. We find that the fraction of galaxies that have irregular gas
kinematics is remarkably similar in galaxy clusters and in the field at
intermediate redshifts. The distribution of the field and cluster galaxies in
(ir)regularity parameters space is also similar. On the other hand galaxies
with small central concentration of light, that we see in the field sample, are
absent in the cluster sample. We find that field galaxies at intermediate
redshifts have more irregular velocity fields as well as more clumpy and less
centrally concentrated light distributions than their local counterparts.
Comparison with a SINS sample of 11 z ~ 2 galaxies shows that these distant
galaxies have more irregular gas kinematics than our intermediate redshift
cluster and field sample. We do not find a dependence of the irregularities in
gas kinematics on morphological type. We find that two different indicators of
star formation correlate with irregularity in the gas kinematics. More
irregular gas kinematics, also more clumpy and less centrally concentrated
light distributions of spiral field galaxies at intermediate redshifts in
comparison to their local counterparts indicate that these galaxies are
probably still in the process of building their disks via mechanisms such as
accretion and mergers. On the other hand, they have less irregular gas
kinematics compared to galaxies at z ~ 2.Comment: Accepted for publication in A&A, high resolution version available at
http://www.astro.rug.nl/~kutdemir/13262/13262_hr.p