No Arabic abstract
We study, for the first time in a statistically significant and well-defined sample, the relation between the outer-disk ionized-gas metallicity gradients and the presence of breaks in the surface brightness profiles of disk galaxies. SDSS g- and r-band surface brightness, (g- r) color, and ionized-gas oxygen abundance profiles for 324 galaxies within the CALIFA survey are used for this purpose. We perform a detailed light-profile classification finding that 84% of our disks show down- or up-bending profiles (Type II and Type III, respectively) while the remaining 16% are well fitted by one single exponential (Type I). The analysis of the color gradients at both sides of this break shows a U-shaped profile for most Type II galaxies with an average minimum (g- r) color of ~0.5 mag and a ionized-gas metallicity flattening associated to it only in the case of low-mass galaxies. More massive systems show a rather uniform negative metallicity gradient. The correlation between metallicity flattening and stellar mass results in p-values as low as 0.01. Independently of the mechanism having shaped the outer light profiles of these galaxies, stellar migration or a previous episode of star formation in a shrinking star-forming disk, it is clear that the imprint in their ionized-gas metallicity was different for low- and high-mass Type II galaxies. In the case of Type III disks, a positive correlation between the change in color and abundance gradient is found (the null hypothesis is ruled out with a p-value of 0.02), with the outer disks of Type III galaxies with masses $leq$10$^{10}$ M$_{odot}$ showing a weak color reddening or even a bluing. This is interpreted as primarily due to a mass down-sizing effect on the population of Type III galaxies having recently experienced an enhanced inside-out growth.
We use a large sample of galaxies at z~3 to establish a relationship between reddening, neutral gas covering fraction (fcov(HI)), and the escape of ionizing photons at high redshift. Our sample includes 933 galaxies at z~3, 121 of which have very deep spectroscopic observations (>7 hrs) in the rest-UV (lambda=850-1300 A) with Keck/LRIS. Based on the high covering fraction of outflowing optically-thick HI indicated by the composite spectra of these galaxies, we conclude that photoelectric absorption, rather than dust attenuation, dominates the depletion of ionizing photons. By modeling the composite spectra as the combination of an unattenuated stellar spectrum including nebular continuum emission with one that is absorbed by HI and reddened by a line-of-sight extinction, we derive an empirical relationship between E(B-V) and fcov(HI). Galaxies with redder UV continua have larger covering fractions of HI characterized by higher line-of-sight extinctions. Our results are consistent with the escape of Lya through gas-free lines-of-sight. Covering fractions based on low-ionization interstellar absorption lines systematically underpredict those deduced from the HI lines, suggesting that much of the outflowing gas may be metal-poor. We develop a model which connects the ionizing escape fraction with E(B-V), and which may be used to estimate the escape fraction for an ensemble of high-redshift galaxies. Alternatively, direct measurements of the escape fraction for our data allow us to constrain the intrinsic 900-to-1500 A flux density ratio to be >0.20, a value that favors stellar population models that include weaker stellar winds, a flatter initial mass function, and/or binary evolution. Lastly, we demonstrate how the framework discussed here may be used to assess the pathways by which ionizing radiation escapes from high-redshift galaxies. [Abridged]
The compositions of nascent planets depend on the compositions of their birth disks. In particular, the elemental compositions of Gas Giant gaseous envelopes depend on the elemental composition of the disk gas from which the envelope is accreted. Previous models demonstrated that sequential freeze-out of O and C-bearing volatiles in disks will result in an supersolar C/O ratios and subsolar C/H ratios in the gas between water and CO snowlines. This result does not take into account, however, the expected grain growth and radial drift of pebbles in disks, and the accompanying re-distribution of volatiles from the outer to the inner disk. Using a toy model we demonstrate that when drift is considered, CO is enhanced between the water and CO snowline, resulting in both supersolar C/O and C/H ratios in the disk gas in the Gas Giant formation zone. This result appears robust to the details of the disk model as long as there is substantial pebble drift across the CO snowline, and the efficiency of CO vapor diffusion is limited. Gas Giants that accrete their gaseous envelopes exterior to the water snowline and do not experience substantial core-envelope mixing, may thus present both superstellar C/O and C/H ratios in their atmospheres. Pebble drift will also affect the nitrogen and noble gas abundances in the planet forming zones, which may explain some of Jupiters peculiar abundance patterns.
We employ the earlier published proper motions of the newly discovered Antlia 2 dwarf galaxy derived from Gaia data to calculate its orbital distribution in the cosmologically recent past. Using these observationally motivated orbits, we calculate the effect of the Antlia 2 dwarf galaxy on the outer HI disk of the Milky Way, using both test particle and Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics simulations. We find that orbits with low pericenters, $sim$ 10 kpc, produce disturbances that match the observed outer HI disk perturbations. We have independently recalculated the proper motion of the Antlia 2 dwarf from Gaia data and found a proper motion of $(mu_{alpha}cosdelta, mu_{delta}) = (-0.068,0.032) pm (0.023,-0.031)~rm mas/yr$, which agrees with results from Torrealba et al. (2019) within the errors, but gives lower mean pericenters, e.g., $sim$ 15 kpc for our fiducial model of the Milky Way. We also show that the Sagittarius dwarf galaxy interaction does not match the observed perturbations in the outer gas disk. Thus, Antlia 2 may be the driver of the observed large perturbations in the outer gas disk of the Galaxy. The current location of the Antlia 2 dwarf galaxy closely matches that predicted by an earlier dynamical analysis (Chakrabarti & Blitz 2009) of the dwarf that drove ripples in the outer Galaxy, and, in particular, its orbit is nearly coplanar to the Galactic disk. If the Antlia 2 dwarf galaxy is responsible for the perturbations in the outer Galactic disk, it would have a specific range of proper motions that we predict here; this can be tested soon with Gaia DR-3 and Gaia DR-4 data.
We present the serendipitous discovery of an extremely broad ($Delta V_{LSR} sim 150$ km/s), faint ($T_{mb} < 10 textrm{mK}$), and ubiquitous 1667 and 1665 MHz ground-state thermal OH emission towards the 2nd quadrant of the outer Galaxy ($R_{gal}$ > 8 kpc) with the Green Bank Telescope. Originally discovered in 2015, we describe the redundant experimental, observational, and data quality tests of this result over the last five years. The longitude-velocity distribution of the emission unambiguously suggests large-scale Galactic structure. We observe a smooth distribution of OH in radial velocity that is morphologically similar to the HI radial velocity distribution in the outer Galaxy, showing that molecular gas is significantly more extended in the outer Galaxy than previously expected. Our results imply the existence of a thick ($-200< z < 200$ pc) disk of diffuse ($n_{H_{2}}$ $sim$ 5 $times$ 10$^{-3}$ cm$^{-3}$) molecular gas in the Outer Galaxy previously undetected in all-sky CO surveys.