Very gas-rich extremely metal-poor blue void dwarfs


Abstract in English

Half-dozen of extreme representatives of void dwarf galaxy population were found in our study of evolutionary status of a hundred galaxies in the nearby Lynx-Cancer void. They are very gas-rich, extremely low-metallicity [7.0 < 12+log(O/H)< ~7.3] objects, with blue colours of outer parts. The colours indicate the ages of the oldest visible stellar population of one to a few Gyr. They all are intrinsically faint, mostly Low Surface Brightness dwarfs, with M_B range of -9.5 to -14 mag. Thus, their finding is a subject of the severe observational selection. The recent advancement in search for such objects in other nearby voids resulted in doubled their total number. We summarize all available data on this group of unusual void dwarf galaxies and discuss them in the general context of very low metallicity galaxies and their possible formation and evolutionary scenarios.

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