We present an observational study of the stellar mass function of satellite galaxies around central galaxies at 0.2<z<1.2. Using statistical background subtraction of contaminating sources we derive satellite stellar mass distributions in four bins o
f central galaxy mass in three redshift ranges. Our results show that the stellar mass function of satellite galaxies increases with central galaxy mass, and that the distribution of satellite masses at fixed central mass is at most weakly dependent on redshift. We conclude that the average mass distribution of galaxies in groups is remarkably universal even out to z=1.2 and that it can be uniquely characterized by the group central galaxy mass. This further suggests that as central galaxies grow in stellar mass, they do so in tandem with the mass growth of their satellites. Finally, we classify all galaxies as either star forming or quiescent, and derive the mass functions of each subpopulation separately. We find that the mass distribution of both star forming and quiescent satellites show minimal redshift dependence at fixed central mass. However, while the fraction of quiescent satellite galaxies increases rapidly with increasing central galaxy mass, that of star forming satellites decreases.
Using observations from the FourStar Galaxy Evolution Survey (ZFOURGE), we obtain the deepest measurements to date of the galaxy stellar mass function at 0.5 < z < 2.5. ZFOURGE provides well-constrained photometric redshifts made possible through dee
p medium-bandwidth imaging at 1-2um . We combine this with HST imaging from the Cosmic Assembly Near-IR Deep Extragalactic Legacy Survey (CANDELS), allowing for the efficient selection of both blue and red galaxies down to stellar masses ~10^9.5 Msol at z ~ 2.5. The total surveyed area is 316 arcmin^2 distributed over three independent fields. We supplement these data with the wider and shallower NEWFIRM Medium-Band Survey (NMBS) to provide stronger constraints at high masses. Several studies at z<=1 have revealed a steepening of the slope at the low-mass end of the stellar mass function (SMF), leading to an upturn at masses <10^10 Msol that is not well-described by a standard single-Schechter function. We find evidence that this feature extends to at least z ~ 2, and that it can be found in both the star-forming and quiescent populations individually. The characteristic mass (M*) and slope at the lowest masses (alpha) of a double-Schechter function fit to the SMF stay roughly constant at Log(M/Msol) ~ 10.65 and ~-1.5 respectively. The SMF of star-forming galaxies has evolved primarily in normalization, while the change in shape is relatively minor. This is not the case for quiescent galaxies: the depth of our imaging allows us to show for the first time significantly more evolution at Log(M/Msol) < 10.5 than at higher masses. We find that the total mass density (down to 10^9 Msol) in star-forming galaxies has increased by a factor of ~2.2 since z ~ 2.5, whereas in quiescent galaxies it has increased by a factor of ~12 .
Recent work has shown that the star formation-density relation -- in which galaxies with low star formation rates are preferentially found in dense environments -- is still in place at z~1, but the situation becomes less clear at higher redshifts. We
use mass-selected samples drawn from the UKIDSS Ultra-Deep Survey to show that galaxies with quenched star formation tend to reside in dense environments out to at least z~1.8. Over most of this redshift range we are able to demonstrate that this star formation-density relation holds even at fixed stellar mass. The environmental quenching of star formation appears to operate with similar efficiency on all galaxies regardless of stellar mass. Nevertheless, the environment plays a greater role in the build-up of the red sequence at lower masses, whereas other quenching processes dominate at higher masses. In addition to a statistical analysis of environmental densities, we investigate a cluster at z=1.6, and show that the central region has an elevated fraction of quiescent objects relative to the field. Although the uncertainties are large, the environmental quenching efficiency in this cluster is consistent with that of galaxy groups and clusters at z~0. In this work we rely on photometric redshifts, and describe some of the pitfalls that large redshift errors can present.
Much of the science that is made possible by multiwavelength redshift surveys requires the use of photometric redshifts. But as these surveys become more ambitious, and as we seek to perform increasingly accurate measurements, it becomes crucial to t
ake proper account of the photometric redshift uncertainties. Ideally the uncertainties can be directly measured using a comparison to spectroscopic redshifts, but this may yield misleading results since spectroscopic samples are frequently small and not representative of the parent photometric samples. We present a simple and powerful empirical method to constrain photometric redshift uncertainties in the absence of spectroscopic redshifts. Close pairs of galaxies on the sky have a significant probability of being physically associated, and therefore of lying at nearly the same redshift. The difference in photometric redshifts in close pairs is therefore a measure of the redshift uncertainty. Some observed close pairs will arise from chance projections along the line of sight, but it is straightforward to perform a statistical correction for this effect. We demonstrate the technique using both simulated data and actual observations, and discuss how its usefulness can be limited by the presence of systematic photometric redshift errors. Finally, we use this technique to show how photometric redshift accuracy can depend on galaxy type.
We investigate the properties of quiescent and star-forming galaxy populations to z~2 with purely photometric data, employing a novel rest-frame color selection technique. From the UKIDSS Ultra-Deep Survey Data Release 1, with matched optical and mid
-IR photometry taken from the Subaru XMM Deep Survey and Spitzer Wide-Area Infrared Extragalactic Survey respectively, we construct a K-selected galaxy catalog and calculate photometric redshifts. Excluding stars, objects with uncertain z_phot solutions, those that fall in bad or incomplete survey regions, and those for which reliable rest-frame colors could not be derived, 30108 galaxies with K<22.4 (AB) and z<2.5 remain. The galaxies in this sample are found to occupy two distinct populations in the rest-frame U-V vs. V-J color space: a clump of red, quiescent galaxies (analogous to the red sequence) and a track of star-forming galaxies extending from blue to red U-V colors. This bimodal behavior is seen up to z~2. Due to a combination of measurement errors and passive evolution, the color-color diagram is not suitable to distinguish the galaxy bimodality at z>2 for this sample, but we show that MIPS 24um data suggest that a significant population of quiescent galaxies exists even at these higher redshifts. At z=1-2, the most luminous objects in the sample are divided roughly equally between star-forming and quiescent galaxies, while at lower redshifts most of the brightest galaxies are quiescent. Moreover, quiescent galaxies at these redshifts are clustered more strongly than those actively forming stars, indicating that galaxies with early-quenched star formation may occupy more massive host dark matter halos. This suggests that the end of star formation is associated with, and perhaps brought about by, a mechanism related to halo mass.
Recent studies have shown that distant red galaxies (DRGs), which dominate the high-mass end of the galaxy population at z~2.5, are more strongly clustered than the population of blue star-forming galaxies at similar redshifts. However these studies
have been severely hampered by the small sizes of fields having deep near-infrared imaging. Here we use the large UKIDSS Ultra Deep Survey to study the clustering of DRGs. The size and depth of this survey allows for an unprecedented measurement of the angular clustering of DRGs at 2<z_phot<3 and K<21. The correlation function shows the expected power law behavior, but with an apparent upturn at theta<~10. We deproject the angular clustering to infer the spatial correlation length, finding 10.6+-1.6 h^-1 Mpc. We use the halo occupation distribution framework to demonstrate that the observed strong clustering of DRGs is not consistent with standard models of galaxy clustering, confirming previous suggestions that were based on smaller samples. Inaccurate photometric redshifts could artificially enhance the observed clustering, however significant systematic redshift errors would be required to bring the measurements into agreement with the models. Another possibility is that the underlying assumption that galaxies interact with their large-scale environment only through halo mass is not valid, and that other factors drive the evolution of the oldest, most massive galaxies at z~2.
