764 research outputs found
The Evolution of the Baryonic Tully-Fisher Relation over the past 6 Gyr
Scaling relations are salient ingredients of galaxy evolution and formation
models. I summarize results from the IMAGES survey, which combines
spatially-resolved kinematics from FLAMES/GIRAFFE with imaging from HST/ACS and
other facilities. Specifically, I will focus on the evolution of the stellar
mass and baryonic Tully-Fisher Relations (TFR) from z=0.6 down to z=0. We found
a significant evolution in zero point and scatter of the stellar mass TFR
compared to the local Universe. Combined with gas fractions derived by
inverting the Schmidt-Kennicutt relation, we derived for the first time a
baryonic TFR at high redshift. Conversely to the stellar mass TFR, the baryonic
relation does not appear to evolve in zero point, which suggests that most of
the reservoir of gas converted into stars over the past 6 Gyr was already
gravitationally bound to galaxies at z=0.6.Comment: To be published in the proceedings of the IAU Symposium 277 "Tracing
the Ancestry of Galaxies"; 4 pages, 1 figur
The formation of disks in massive spiral galaxies
The flatness of the rotation curve inside spiral galaxies is interpreted as
the imprint of a halo of invisible matter. Using the deepest observations of
distant galaxies, we have investigated how large disks could have been formed.
Observations include spatially resolved kinematics, detailed morphologies and
photometry from UV to mid-IR. Six Giga-years ago, half of the present-day
spirals had anomalous kinematics and morphologies that considerably affect the
scatter of the Tully Fisher relation. All anomalous galaxies can be modelled
through gas-rich, major mergers that lead to a rebuilt of a new disk. The
spiral-rebuilding scenario is proposed as a new channel to form large disks in
present-day spirals and it accounts for all the observed evolutions since the
last 6 Giga-years. A large fraction of the star formation is linked to merging
events during their whole durations.Comment: AIP Proceedings of a review given at the "Invisible Universe
International Conference" held in Paris, June 2009. 16 pages, 9 Figure
Coupling MOAO with Integral Field Spectroscopy: specifications for the VLT and the E-ELT
[Abridged] We have developed an end-to-end simulation to specify the science
requirements of a MOAO-fed integral field spectrograph on either an 8m or 42m
telescope. Our simulations re-scales observations of local galaxies or results
from numerical simulations of disk or interacting galaxies. For the current
analysis, we limit ourselves to a local disk galaxy which exhibits simple
rotation and a simulation of a merger. We have attempted to generalize our
results by introducing the simple concepts of "PSF contrast" which is the
amount of light polluting adjacent spectra which we find drives the smallest EE
at a given spatial scale. The choice of the spatial sampling is driven by the
"scale-coupling", i.e., the relationship between the IFU pixel scale and the
size of the features that need to be recovered by 3D spectroscopy in order to
understand the nature of the galaxy and its substructure. Because the dynamical
nature of galaxies are mostly reflected in their large-scale motions, a
relatively coarse spatial resolution is enough to distinguish between a
rotating disk and a major merger. Although we used a limited number of
morpho-kinematic cases, our simulations suggest that, on a 42m telescope, the
choice of an IFU pixel scale of 50-75 mas seems to be sufficient. Such a coarse
sampling has the benefit of lowering the exposure time to reach a specific
signal-to-noise as well as relaxing the performance of the MOAO system. On the
other hand, recovering the full 2D-kinematics of z~4 galaxies requires high
signal-to-noise and at least an EE of 34% in 150 mas (2 pixels of 75 mas).
Finally, we carried out a similar study at z=1.6 with a MOAO-fed spectrograph
for an 8m, and find that at least an EE of 30% at 0.25 arcsec spatial sampling
is required to understand the nature of disks and mergers.Comment: 17 pages, 20 figures, accepted for publication in the MNRA
A forming disk at z~0.6: Collapse of a gaseous disk or major merger remnant?
[Abridged] We present and analyze observations of J033241.88-274853.9 at
z=0.6679, using multi-wavelength photometry and imaging with FLAMES/GIRAFFE 3D
spectroscopy. J033241.88-274853.9 is found to be a blue, young (~320Myr)
stellar disk embedded in a very gas-rich (fgas=73-82% with
log(Mstellar/Mo)=9.45) and turbulent phase that is found to be rotating on
large spatial scales. We identified two unusual properties of
J033241.88-274853.9. (1) The spatial distributions of the ionized gaseous and
young stars show a strong decoupling; while almost no stars can be detected in
the southern part down to the very deep detection limit of ACS/UDF images,
significant emission from the [OII] ionized gas is detected. (2) We detect an
excess of velocity dispersion in the southern part of J033241.88-274853.9 in
comparison to expectations from a rotating disk model. We considered two disk
formation scenarios, depending on the gaseous phase geometry. In the first one,
we examined whether J033241.88-274853.9 could be a young rotating disk that has
been recently collapsed from a pre-existing, very gas-rich rotating disk. This
scenario requires two (unknown) additional assumptions to explain the
decoupling between the distribution of stars and gas and the excess of velocity
dispersion in the same region. In a second scenario, we examine whether
J033241.88-274853.9 could be a merger remnant of two gas-rich disks. In this
case, the asymmetry observed between the gas and star distributions, as well as
the excess of velocity dispersion, find a common explanation. Shocks produced
during the merger in this region can be ionized easily and heat the gas while
preventing star formation. This makes this scenario more satisfactory than the
collapse of a pre-existing, gas-rich rotating disk.Comment: Accepted for publication in A&A. 8 pages & 5 figure
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