Subscribe to the gold package and get unlimited access to Shamra Academy
Register a new userSDSS IV MaNGA: Discovery of an $H_{alpha}$ blob associated with a dry galaxy pair -- ejected gas or a `dark galaxy candidate?
50
0
0.0
(
0
)
Ask ChatGPT about the research
No Arabic abstract
We report the discovery of a mysterious giant $H_{alpha}$ blob that is $sim 8$ kpc away from the main MaNGA target 1-24145, one component of a dry galaxy merger, identified in the first-year SDSS-IV MaNGA data. The size of the $H_{alpha}$ blob is $sim$ 3-4 kpc in radius, and the $H_{alpha}$ distribution is centrally concentrated. However, there is no optical continuum counterpart in deep broadband images reaching $sim$26.9 mag arcsec$^{-2}$ in surface brightness. We estimate that the masses of ionized and cold gases are $3.3 times 10^{5}$ $rm M_{odot}$ and $< 1.3 times 10^{9}$ $rm M_{odot}$, respectively. The emission-line ratios indicate that the $H_{alpha}$ blob is photoionized by a combination of massive young stars and AGN. Furthermore, the ionization line ratio decreases from MaNGA 1-24145 to the $H_{alpha}$ blob, suggesting that the primary ionizing source may come from MaNGA 1-24145, likely a low-activity AGN. Possible explanations of this $H_{alpha}$ blob include AGN outflow, the gas remnant being tidally or ram-pressure stripped from MaNGA 1-24145, or an extremely low surface brightness (LSB) galaxy. However, the stripping scenario is less favoured according to galaxy merger simulations and the morphology of the $H_{alpha}$ blob. With the current data, we can not distinguish whether this $H_{alpha}$ blob is ejected gas due to a past AGN outburst, or a special category of `ultra-diffuse galaxy (UDG) interacting with MaNGA 1-24145 that further induces the gas inflow to fuel the AGN in MaNGA 1-24145.
rate research
Read More
Galaxies in dense environments, such as groups and clusters, experience various processes by which galaxies gain and lose gas. Using data from the SDSS-IV MaNGA survey, we previously reported the discovery of a giant (6 -- 8 kpc in diameter) H$alpha$ blob, Totoro, about 8 kpc away from a pair of galaxies (Satsuki and Mei) residing in a galaxy group which is experiencing a group-group merger. Here, we combine interferometric $^{12}$CO(1--0) molecular gas data, new wide-field H$alpha$, $u$-band data, and published X-ray data to determine the origin of the blob. Several scenarios are discussed to account for its multi-wavelength properties, including (1) H$alpha$ gas being stripped from galaxy Satsuki by ram-pressure; (2) a separated low-surface-brightness galaxy; (3) gas being ejected or ionized by an active galactic nucleus (AGN); and (4) a cooling intra-group medium (IGM). Scenarios (1) and (2) are less favored by the present data. Scenario (3) is also less likely as there is no evidence for an active ongoing AGN in the host galaxy. We find that the CO (cold) and H$alpha$ (warm) gas coexist with X-ray (hot) structures; moreover, the derived cooling time is within the regime where molecular and H$alpha$ gas are expected. The coexistence of gas with different temperatures also agrees with that of cooling gas in other systems. Our multi-wavelength results strongly suggest that the CO and H$alpha$ gas are the product of cooling from the IGM at its current location, i.e., cooling has occurred, and may be ongoing, well outside the host-galaxy core.
Bright Ly-$alpha$ blobs (LABs) --- extended nebulae with sizes of $sim$100kpc and Ly-$alpha$ luminosities of $sim$10$^{44}$erg s$^{-1}$ --- often reside in overdensities of compact Ly-$alpha$ emitters (LAEs) that may be galaxy protoclusters. The number density, variance, and internal kinematics of LABs suggest that they themselves trace group-like halos. Here we test this hierarchical picture, presenting deep, wide-field Ly-$alpha$ narrowband imaging of a 1$^circ$ $times$ 0.5$^circ$ region around a LAB pair at $z$ = 2.3 discovered previously by a blind survey. We find 183 Ly-$alpha$ emitters, including the original LAB pair and three new LABs with Ly-$alpha$ luminosities of (0.9--1.3)$times$10$^{43}$erg s$^{-1}$ and isophotal areas of 16--24 arcsec$^2$. Using the LAEs as tracers and a new kernel density estimation method, we discover a large-scale overdensity (Bo{o}tes J1430+3522) with a surface density contrast of $delta_{Sigma}$ = 2.7, a volume density contrast of $delta$ $sim$ 10.4, and a projected diameter of $approx$ 20 comoving Mpc. Comparing with cosmological simulations, we conclude that this LAE overdensity will evolve into a present-day Coma-like cluster with $log{(M/M_odot)}$ $sim$ $15.1pm0.2$. In this and three other wide-field LAE surveys re-analyzed here, the extents and peak amplitudes of the largest LAE overdensities are similar, not increasing with survey size, implying that they were indeed the largest structures then and do evolve into rich clusters today. Intriguingly, LABs favor the outskirts of the densest LAE concentrations, i.e., intermediate LAE overdensities of $delta_Sigma = 1 - 2$. We speculate that these LABs mark infalling proto-groups being accreted by the more massive protocluster.
We have identified 105 galaxy pairs at z ~ 0.04 with the MaNGA integral-field spectroscopic data. The pairs have projected separations between 1 kpc and 30 kpc, and are selected to have radial velocity offsets less than 600 km/s and stellar mass ratio between 0.1 and 1. The pair fraction increases with both the physical size of the integral-field unit and the stellar mass, consistent with theoretical expectations. We provide the best-fit analytical function of the pair fraction and find that ~3% of M* galaxies are in close pairs. For both isolated galaxies and paired galaxies, active galactic nuclei (AGN) are selected using emission-line ratios and H_alpha equivalent widths measured inside apertures at a fixed physical size. We find AGNs in ~24% of the paired galaxies and binary AGNs in ~13% of the pairs. To account for the selection biases in both the pair sample and the MaNGA sample, we compare the AGN comoving volume densities with those expected from the mass- and redshift-dependent AGN fractions. We find a strong (~5x) excess of binary AGNs over random pairing and a mild (~20%) deficit of single AGNs. The binary AGN excess increases from ~2x to ~6x as the projected separation decreases from 10-30 kpc to 1-10 kpc. Our results indicate that pairing of galaxies preserves the AGN duty cycle in individual galaxies but increases the population of binary AGNs through correlated activities. We suggest tidally-induced galactic-scale shocks and AGN cross-ionization as two plausible channels to produce low-luminosity narrow-line-selected binary AGNs.
We study the internal radial gradients of stellar population properties within $1.5;R_{rm e}$ and analyse the impact of galaxy environment. We use a representative sample of 721 galaxies with masses ranging between $10^{9};M_{odot}$ to $10^{11.5};M_{odot}$ from the SDSS-IV survey MaNGA. We split this sample by morphology into early-type and late-type galaxies. Using the full spectral fitting code FIREFLY, we derive the light and mass-weighted stellar population properties age and metallicity, and calculate the gradients of these properties. We use three independent methods to quantify galaxy environment, namely the $N^{th}$ nearest neighbour, the tidal strength parameter $Q$ and distinguish between central and satellite galaxies. In our analysis, we find that early-type galaxies generally exhibit shallow light-weighted age gradients in agreement with the literature and mass-weighted median age gradients tend to be slightly positive. Late-type galaxies, instead, have negative light-weighted age gradients. We detect negative metallicity gradients in both early and late-type galaxies that correlate with galaxy mass, with the gradients being steeper and the correlation with mass being stronger in late-types. We find, however, that stellar population gradients, for both morphological classifications, have no significant correlation with galaxy environment for all three characterisations of environment. Our results suggest that galaxy mass is the main driver of stellar population gradients in both early and late-type galaxies, and any environmental dependence, if present at all, must be very subtle.
Chemical abundance determinations in Low-Ionization Nuclear Line Regions (LINERs) are especially complex and uncertain because the nature of the ionizing source of this kind of object is unknown. In this work, we study the oxygen abundance in relation to the hydrogen abundance (O/H) of the gas phase of the UGC4805 LINER nucleus. Optical spectroscopic data from the Mapping Nearby Galaxies (MaNGA) survey was employed to derive the O/H abundance of the UGC4805 nucleus based on the extrapolation of the disk abundance gradient, on calibrations between O/H abundance and strong emission-lines for Active Galactic Nuclei (AGNs) as well as on photoionization models built with the Cloudy code, assuming gas accretion into a black hole (AGN) and post-Asymptotic Giant Branch (p-AGB) stars with different effective temperatures. We found that abundance gradient extrapolations, AGN calibrations, AGN and p-AGB photoionization models produce similar O/H values for the UGC4805 nucleus and similar ionization parameter values. The study demonstrated that the methods used to estimate the O/H abundance using nuclear emission-line ratios produce reliable results, which are in agreement with the O/H values obtained from the independent method of galactic metallicity gradient extrapolation. Finally, the results from the WHAN diagram combined with the fact that the high excitation level of the gas has to be maintained at kpc scales, we suggest that the main ionizing source of the UGC4805 nucleus probably has a stellar origin rather than an AGN.
Log in to be able to interact and post comments
comments
Fetching comments
Sign in to be able to follow your search criteria
