No Arabic abstract
Observations in the rest frame ultraviolet from various space missions are used to define the nearby starburst regions having the highest surface brightness on scales of several hundred pc. The bright limit is found to be 6x10^-16 ergs/cm^2-s-A-arcsec^2 for rest frame wavelength of 1830 A. Surface brightness in the brightest pixel is measured for 18 galaxies in the Hubble Deep Field having z > 2.2. After correcting for cosmological dimming, we find that the high redshift starbursts have intrinsic ultraviolet surface brightness that is typically four times brighter than low redshift starbursts. It is not possible to conclude whether this difference is caused by decreased dust obscuration in the high redshift starburst regions or by intrinsically more intense star formation. Surface brightness enhancement of starburst regions may be the primary factor for explaining the observed increase with redshift of the ultraviolet luminosity arising from star formation.
We use galaxy surface brightness as prior information to improve photometric redshift (photo-z) estimation. We apply our template-based photo-z method to imaging data from the ground-based VVDS survey and the space-based GOODS field from HST, and use spectroscopic redshifts to test our photometric redshifts for different galaxy types and redshifts. We find that the surface brightness prior eliminates a large fraction of outliers by lifting the degeneracy between the Lyman and 4000 Angstrom breaks. Bias and scatter are improved by about a factor of 2 with the prior for both the ground and space data. Ongoing and planned surveys from the ground and space will benefit, provided that care is taken in measurements of galaxy sizes and in the application of the prior. We discuss the image quality and signal-to-noise requirements that enable the surface brightness prior to be successfully applied.
The past few years have seen a steady progress in the determination of element abundances at high redshifts, with new and more accurate measures of metallicities in star-forming galaxies, in QSO absorbers, and in the intergalactic medium. We have also become more aware of the limitations of the tools at our disposal in such endeavours. I summarise these recent developments and--in tune with the theme of this meeting--consider the clues which chemical abundance studies offer to the links between the high redshift galaxy populations and todays galaxies. The new data are `fleshing out the overall picture of element abundances at redshifts z = 2 - 3 which has been gradually coming into focus over the last decade. In particular, we can now account for at least 40% of the metals produced by the global star formation activity in the universe from the Big Bang to z = 2.5, and we have strong indications of where the remainder are likely to be found.
We investigate the relation between the asymptotic circular velocity, V_c, and the central stellar velocity dispersion, sigma_c, in galaxies. We consider a new sample of high surface brightness spiral galaxies (HSB), low surface brightness spiral galaxies (LSB), and elliptical galaxies with HI-based V_c measurements. We find that: 1) elliptical galaxies with HI measurements fit well within the relation; 2) a linear law can reproduce the data as well as a power law (used in previous works) even for galaxies with sigma_c < 70 km/s; 3) LSB galaxies, considered for the first time with this respect, seem to behave differently, showing either larger V_c values or smaller sigma_c values.
We examine the infrared properties of five low surface brightness galaxies (LSBGs) and compare them with related but higher surface brightness galaxies, using Spitzer Space Telescope images and spectra. All the LSBGs are detected in the 3.6 and 4.5um bands, representing the stellar population. All but one are detected at 5.8 and 8.0um, revealing emission from hot dust and aromatic molecules, though many are faint or point-like at these wavelengths. Detections of LSBGs at the far-infrared wavelengths, 24, 70, and 160um, are varied in morphology and brightness, with only two detections at 160um, resulting in highly varied spectral energy distributions. Consistent with previous expectations for these galaxies, we find that detectable dust components exist for only some LSBGs, with the strength of dust emission dependent on the existence of bright star forming regions. However, the far-infrared emission may be relatively weak compared with normal star-forming galaxies.
The periphery of the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) can unlock important information regarding galaxy formation and evolution in interacting systems. Here, we present a detailed study of the extended stellar structure of the SMC using deep colour-magnitude diagrams (CMDs), obtained as part of the Survey of the MAgellanic Stellar History (SMASH). Special care was taken in the decontamination of our data from MW foreground stars, including from foreground globular clusters NGC 362 and 47 Tuc. We derived the SMC surface brightness using a ``conservative approach from which we calculated the general parameters of the SMC, finding a staggered surface brightness profile. We also traced the fainter outskirts by constructing a stellar density profile. This approach, based on stellar counts of the oldest main sequence turn-off (MSTO) stars, uncovered a tidally disrupted stellar feature that reaches as far out as 12 degrees from the SMC centre. We also serendipitously found a faint feature of unknown origin located at $sim 14$ degrees from the centre of the SMC and that we tentatively associated to a more distant structure. We compared our results to in-house simulations of a $1times10^{9} M_odot$ SMC, finding that its elliptical shape can be explained by its tidal disruption under the combined presence of the MW and the LMC. Finally, we found that the older stellar populations show a smooth profile while the younger component presents a jump in the density followed by a flat profile, confirming the heavily disturbed nature of the SMC.