Start year
2004
Organizational Unit
Organizing institutions
Grants related:
General
Description
Galaxies in the universe can be located in different environments, some of them are isolated or in low density regions and they are usually called field galaxies. The others can be located in galaxy associations, going from loose groups to clusters or even superclusters of galaxies. One of the foremost challenges of the modern Astrophysics is to achieve a complete theory about galaxy evolution. This theory should explain the relation between the environment and galaxy evolution. Galaxy clusters are high density environments where galaxies interact one to each other and with the intracluster material (ICM). In addition, the cluster dynamics is driven by the high density and quantity of dark matter present in them. Therefore, galaxy clusters are complex systems with multiple components (galaxies, ICM, dark matter) which are tightly bounded. The mix of all these components, as well as their interactions, makes galaxy clusters ideal laboratories to study the different mechanisms which cause the different evolution of galaxies in this high density environments with respect to field galaxies.
The objective of this project is to study the formation and evolution of galaxies in these dense environments. The ‘Galaxy Evolution in Clusters’ group intend to understand in what environment each of the mechanisms proposed by numerical simulations to transform the galaxies dominates and how the evolution of the different types of galaxies (both bright and dwarf) occurs in the clusters. Quantifying observationally the efficiency of these mechanisms is not an easy task since many of them act at the same time, they do it in very different time scales, and in diverse regions of the cluster. However, there are some observational evidences that can be directly contrasted: i) morphological and structural distribution of the galaxies of the clusters; ii) luminosity function of galaxies in clusters; iii) diffuse light (quantity and distribution); iv) presence of galactic substructures within the clusters; v) spectro-photometric properties of dwarf and bright galaxies; vi) ICM properties. All these observables provide the necessary information to understand the relationship between environment and galactic evolution. These are the quantities this project aims at measuring for large samples of galaxy clusters.
Members
Principal investigator
Jairo
Méndez Abreu
Project staff
Rafael Delfin
Barrena Delgado
Casiana
Muñoz Tuñón
Claudio
Dalla Vecchia
Dr.
Walter Boschin
José Alfonso
López Aguerri
LILIAN FÁTIMA
DOMÍNGUEZ PALMERO
Collaborators
Dr.
E.M. Corsini
Dr.
L. Morelli
Dr.
J.M. Vílchez
Dr.
J. Iglesias
Dr.
C. del Burgo
Dr.
E. Jiménez Bailon
Dr.
S. Sánchez
Dr.
S. Borgani
Dr.
A. Biviano
Dr.
V. Debattista
Dr.
E. D'Onghia
Dr.
M. Arnaboldi
Dr.
O. Gerhard
Dr.
R. Sánchez Janssen
Dr.
A. Diaferio
Dr.
V. Wild
Dr.
S. Zarattini
Dr.
A. Aragón Salamanca
Dr.
R. Peletier
Dr.
S. Trager
Dr.
G. Dalton
Dr.
M. Girardi
Dr.
L. Constatin
Results
- Intrinsic Shape of Galactic Bars. We find, for the first time, that 52% (16%) of bulges are thicker (flatter) than the surrounding bar. We suggest that these percentages might be representative of the fraction of classical and disc-like bulges in our sample, respectively.
- The Influence of the Environment in the Star Formation Quenching. Our results indicate that in low-density environments, post-starburst galaxies are formed by gas-rich minor mergers or accretions, whereas for high-density environments PSBs would be produced by the removal of the gas reservoirs of emission line galaxies by ram-pressure stripping.
- Morpho-Kinematic Properties of Galactic Bulges. We find that photometric diagnostics to separate different types of bulges (disc-like versus classical) might not be useful for S0 galaxies. Using the morpho-kinematics properties of S0 bulges derived in this paper we suggest that they are mainly formed by dissipational processes happening at high redshift.
Scientific activity
Related publications
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The ALHAMBRA survey: Estimation of the clustering signal encoded in the cosmic varianceAims: The relative cosmic variance (σv) is a fundamental source of uncertainty in pencil-beam surveys and, as a particular case of count-in-cell statistics, can be used to estimate the bias between galaxies and their underlying dark-matter distribution. Our goal is to test the significance of the clustering information encoded in the σv measured inLópez-Sanjuan, C. et al.
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102015 -
Tracing kinematic (mis)alignments in CALIFA merging galaxies. Stellar and ionized gas kinematic orientations at every merger stageWe present spatially resolved stellar and/or ionized gas kinematic properties for a sample of 103 interacting galaxies, tracing all merger stages: close companions, pairs with morphological signatures of interaction, and coalesced merger remnants. In order to distinguish kinematic properties caused by a merger event from those driven by internalBarrera-Ballesteros, J. K. et al.
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102015 -
The sensitivity of harassment to orbit: mass loss from early-type dwarfs in galaxy clustersWe conduct a comprehensive numerical study of the orbital dependence of harassment on early-type dwarfs consisting of 168 different orbits within a realistic, Virgo-like cluster, varying in eccentricity and pericentre distance. We find harassment is only effective at stripping stars or truncating their stellar discs for orbits that enter deep intoSmith, R. et al.
Advertised on:
122015 -
The CALIFA survey across the Hubble sequence. Spatially resolved stellar population properties in galaxiesVarious different physical processes contribute to the star formation and stellar mass assembly histories of galaxies. One important approach to understanding the significance of these different processes on galaxy evolution is the study of the stellar population content of today's galaxies in a spatially resolved manner. The aim of this paper isGonzález Delgado, R. M. et al.
Advertised on:
92015 -
Fossil group origins - VI. Global X-ray scaling relations of fossil galaxy clustersWe present the first pointed X-ray observations of 10 candidate fossil galaxy groups and clusters. With these Suzaku observations, we determine global temperatures and bolometric X-ray luminosities of the intracluster medium (ICM) out to r500 for six systems in our sample. The remaining four systems show signs of significant contamination from nonKundert, A. et al.
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112015 -
Fossil group origins. V. The dependence of the luminosity function on the magnitude gapContext. In nature we observe galaxy aggregations that span a wide range of magnitude gaps between the two first-ranked galaxies of a system (Δm12). Thus, there are systems with gaps close to zero (e.g., the Coma cluster), and at the other extreme of the distribution, the largest gaps are found among the so-called fossil systems. The observedZarattini, S. et al.
Advertised on:
92015 -
The impact from survey depth and resolution on the morphological classification of galaxiesWe consistently analyse for the first time the impact of survey depth and spatial resolution on the most used morphological parameters for classifying galaxies through non-parametric methods: Abraham and Conselice-Bershady concentration indices, Gini, M20 moment of light, asymmetry, and smoothness. Three different non-local data sets are usedQuintana, J. M. et al.
Advertised on:
102015 -
Galaxy clusters and groups in the ALHAMBRA surveyWe present a catalogue of 348 galaxy clusters and groups with 0.2 z 1.2 selected in the 2.78 deg2 Advanced Large, Homogeneous Area Medium Band Redshift Astronomical (ALHAMBRA) survey. The high precision of our photometric redshifts, close to 1 per cent, and the wide spread of the seven ALHAMBRA pointings ensure that this catalogue has better massAscaso, B. et al.
Advertised on:
92015 -
CLASH-VLT: Substructure in the galaxy cluster MACS J1206.2-0847 from kinematics of galaxy populationsAims: In the effort to understand the link between the structure of galaxy clusters and their galaxy populations, we focus on MACS J1206.2-0847 at z ~ 0.44 and probe its substructure in the projected phase space through the spectrophotometric properties of a large number of galaxies from the CLASH-VLT survey. Methods: Our analysis is mainly basedGirardi, M. et al.
Advertised on:
72015 -
On the morphology of dust lanes in galactic barsThe aim of our study is to use dynamical simulations to explore the influence of two important dynamical bar parameters, bar strength and bar pattern speed on the shape of the bar dust lanes. To quantify the shape of the dust lanes we have developed a new systematic method to measure the dust lane curvature. Previous numerical simulations haveSánchez-Menguiano, L. et al.
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72015 -
CALIFA, the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field Area survey. III. Second public data releaseThis paper describes the Second Public Data Release (DR2) of the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field Area (CALIFA) survey. The data for 200 objects are made public, including the 100 galaxies of the First Public Data Release (DR1). Data were obtained with the integral-field spectrograph PMAS/PPak mounted on the 3.5 m telescope at the Calar AltoGarcía-Benito, R. et al.
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42015 -
Bar pattern speeds in CALIFA galaxies. I. Fast bars across the Hubble sequenceContext. The bar pattern speed (Ωb) is defined as the rotational frequency of the bar, and it determines the bar dynamics. Several methods have been proposed for measuring Ωb. The non-parametric method proposed by Tremaine & Weinberg (1984, ApJ, 282, L5; TW) and based on stellar kinematics is the most accurate. This method has been applied so farAguerri, J. A. L. et al.
Advertised on:
42015 -
The ALHAMBRA survey: accurate merger fractions derived by PDF analysis of photometrically close pairsAims: Our goal is to develop and test a novel methodology to compute accurate close-pair fractions with photometric redshifts. Methods: We improved the currently used methodologies to estimate the merger fraction fm from photometric redshifts by (i) using the full probability distribution functions (PDFs) of the sources in redshift space; (ii)López-Sanjuan, C. et al.
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42015 -
High redshift galaxies in the ALHAMBRA survey . I. Selection method and number counts based on redshift PDFsContext. Most observational results on the high redshift restframe UV-bright galaxies are based on samples pinpointed using the so-called dropout technique or Ly-α selection. However, the availability of multifilter data now allows the dropout selections to be replaced by direct methods based on photometric redshifts. In this paper we present theViironen, K. et al.
Advertised on:
42015 -
Ionized gas kinematics of galaxies in the CALIFA survey. I. Velocity fields, kinematic parameters of the dominant component, and presence of kinematically distinct gaseous systemsContext. Ionized gas kinematics provide important clues to the dynamical structure of galaxies and hold constraints to the processes driving their evolution. Aims: The motivation of this work is to provide an overall characterization of the kinematic behavior of the ionized gas of the galaxies included in the Calar Alto Legacy Integral field AreaGarcía-Lorenzo, B. et al.
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12015 -
Secular- and merger-built bulges in barred galaxiesContext. Historically, galaxy bulges were thought to be single-component objects at the center of galaxies. However, this picture is now questioned since different bulge types with different formation paths, namely classical and pseudobulges, have been found coexisting within the same galaxy. Aims: We study the incidence and nature of compositeMéndez-Abreu, J. et al.
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122014 -
Stellar population gradients in galaxy discs from the CALIFA survey. The influence of barsWhile studies of gas-phase metallicity gradients in disc galaxies are common, very little has been done towards the acquisition of stellar abundance gradients in the same regions. We present here a comparative study of the stellar metallicity and age distributions in a sample of 62 nearly face-on, spiral galaxies with and without bars, using dataSánchez-Blázquez, P. et al.
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102014 -
CALIFA: a diameter-selected sample for an integral field spectroscopy galaxy surveyWe describe and discuss the selection procedure and statistical properties of the galaxy sample used by the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field Area (CALIFA) survey, a public legacy survey of 600 galaxies using integral field spectroscopy. The CALIFA "mother sample" was selected from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) DR7 photometric catalogue toWalcher, C. J. et al.
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92014 -
Deep spectroscopic luminosity function of Abell 85: no evidence for a steep upturn of the faint-end slopeWe present a new deep determination of the spectroscopic luminosity function (LF) within the virial radius of the nearby and massive Abell 85 (A85) cluster down to the dwarf regime (M* + 6) using Very Large Telescope/Visible Multi-Object Spectrograph (VLT/VIMOS) spectra for ˜2000 galaxies with mr ≤ 21 mag and ≤ 24 mag arcsec-2. The resulting LFAgulli, I. et al.
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102014 -
The Mice at play in the CALIFA survey. A case study of a gas-rich major merger between first passage and coalescenceWe present optical integral field spectroscopy (IFS) observations of the Mice, a major merger between two massive (≳1011 M⊙) gas-rich spirals NGC 4676A and B, observed between first passage and final coalescence. The spectra provide stellar and gas kinematics, ionised gas properties, and stellar population diagnostics, over the full optical extentWild, V. et al.
Advertised on:
72014
