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Register a new userAn atlas of mid-infrared dust emission in spiral galaxies
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H. Roussel
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We present maps of dust emission at 7 microns and 15 microns/7 microns intensity ratios of selected regions in 43 spiral galaxies observed with ISOCAM. This atlas is a complement to studies based on these observations, dealing with star formation in centers of barred galaxies and in spiral disks. It is accompanied by a detailed description of data reduction and an inventory of generic morphological properties in groups defined according to bar strength and HI gas content.
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We examine far-infrared and submillimeter spectral energy distributions for galaxies in the Infrared Space Observatory Atlas of Bright Spiral Galaxies. For the 71 galaxies where we had complete 60-180 micron data, we fit blackbodies with lambda^-1 emissivities and average temperatures of 31 K or lambda^-2 emissivities and average temperatures of 22 K. Except for high temperatures determined in some early-type galaxies, the temperatures show no dependence on any galaxy characteristic. For the 60-850 micron range in eight galaxies, we fit blackbodies with lambda^-1, lambda-2, and lambda^-beta (with beta variable) emissivities to the data. The best results were with the lambda^-beta emissivities, where the temperatures were ~30 K and the emissivity coefficient beta ranged from 0.9 to 1.9. These results produced gas to dust ratios that ranged from 150 to 580, which were consistent with the ratio for the Milky Way and which exhibited relatively little dispersion compared to fits with fixed emissivities.
We study the mid-infrared properties of a sample of 69 nearby spiral galaxies, selected to avoid Seyfert activity contributing a significant fraction of the central energetics, or strong tidal interaction, and to have normal infrared luminosities. These observations were obtained with ISOCAM, which provides an angular resolution of the order of 10 arcsec (half-power diameter of the point spread function) and low-resolution spectro-imaging information. Between 5 and 18 microns, we mainly observe two dust phases, aromatic infrared bands and very small grains, both out of thermal equilibrium. On this sample, we show that the global F15/F7 colors of galaxies are very uniform, the only increase being found in early-type strongly barred galaxies, consistent with previous IRAS studies. The F15/F7 excesses are unambiguously due to galactic central regions where bar-induced starbursts occur. However, the existence of strongly barred early-type galaxies with normal circumnuclear colors indicates that the relationship between a distortion of the gravitational potential and a central starburst is not straightforward. As the physical processes at work in central regions are in principle identical in barred and unbarred galaxies, and since this is where the mid-infrared activity is mainly located, we investigate the mid-infrared circumnuclear properties of all the galaxies in our sample. We show how surface brightnesses and colors are related to both the available molecular gas content and the mean age of stellar populations contributing to dust heating. Therefore, the star formation history in galactic central regions can be constrained by their position in a color-surface brightness mid-infrared diagram.
We present an atlas of Spitzer/IRS high resolution (R~600) 10-37um spectra for 24 well known starburst galaxies. The spectra are dominated by fine-structure lines, molecular hydrogen lines, and emission bands of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. Six out of the eight objects with a known AGN component show emission of the high excitation [NeV] line. This line is also seen in one other object (NGC4194) with, a priori, no known AGN component. In addition to strong polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon emission features in this wavelength range (11.3, 12.7, 16.4um), the spectra reveal other weak hydrocarbon features at 10.6, 13.5, 14.2um, and a previously unreported emission feature at 10.75um. An unidentified absorption feature at 13.7um is detected in many of the starbursts. We use the fine-structure lines to derive the abundance of neon and sulfur for 14 objects where the HI 7-6 line is detected. We further use the molecular hydrogen lines to sample the properties of the warm molecular gas. Several basic diagrams characterizing the properties of the sample are also shown. We have combined the spectra of all the pure starburst objects to create a high S/N template, which is available to the community.
We study the radial distribution of the temperature of the warm dust and gas-to-dust mass ratios in a sample of 22 spiral galaxies. The heating capabilities of the diffuse interstellar radiation field (ISRF), based on Desert et al. model, are investigated in 13 of the sample galaxies. In general, the temperature of the warm dust decreases away from the center, reaches a minimum value at the mid-disk and increases again in the outer parts of galaxies. Heating a mixture of small and big grains by the ISRF is able to explain the observed behavior qualitatively. However, ultraviolet photons from recent star formation events are necessary for a detailed matching of the warm dust temperature profiles. Very small grains contribute typically more than 50% to the observed flux at 60 micron beyond half the disk radius in galaxies. Optical depth profiles, derived from the observed 60 micron and warm dust temperature profiles, peak at or close to the galactic center. In 13 of the galaxies, where dust temperature profiles are modeled, we obtain gas-to-dust mass ratio profiles, after correction for the contaminating effects of very small grains. The gas-to-dust mass ratio decreases by a factor of 8 from the center to the optical isophotal radius, where the value approaches the local galactic value. We demonstrate that the observed steep gradient is a result of the over-estimation of the molecular mass, and can be flattened out to within a factor of 2, if the molecular hydrogen mass (H2) is recomputed assuming a metallicity dependent conversion factor from CO intensity to H2 column density. The flattened radial profiles indicate a global gas-to-dust ratio of around 300, which is within a factor of two of the local galactic value.
Interstellar dust in galaxies can be traced either through its extinction effects on the star light, or through its thermal emission at infrared wavelengths. Recent radiative transfer studies of several nearby edge-on galaxies have found an apparent inconsistency in the dust energy balance: the radiative transfer models that successfully explain the optical extinction underestimate the observed fluxes by an average factor of three. We investigate the dust energy balance for IC4225 and NGC5166, two edge-on spiral galaxies observed by the Herschel Space Observatory in the frame of the H-ATLAS survey. We start from models which were constrained from optical data and extend them to construct the entire spectral energy distribution of our galaxies. These predicted values are subsequently compared to the observed far-infrared fluxes. We find that including a young stellar population in the modelling is necessary as it plays a non-negligible part in the heating of the dust grains. While the modelling approach for both galaxies is nearly identical, we find two very different results. As is often seen in other edge-on spiral galaxies, the far-infrared emission of our radiative transfer model of IC4225 underestimates the observed fluxes by a factor of about three. For NGC5166 on the other hand, we find that both the predicted spectral energy distribution as well as the simulated images match the observations particularly well. We explore possible reasons for this difference and conclude that it is unlikely that one single mechanism is the cause of the dust energy balance problem in spiral galaxies. We discuss the different approaches that can be considered in order to get a conclusive answer on the origin this discrepancy.
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