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Publication Details
AFRICAN RESEARCH NEXUS
SHINING A SPOTLIGHT ON AFRICAN RESEARCH
earth and planetary sciences
Less than 10 percent of star formation in z ∼ 0.6 massive galaxies is triggered by major interactions
Astrophysical Journal, Volume 704, No. 1, Year 2009
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Description
Both observations and simulations show that major tidal interactions or mergers between gas-rich galaxies can lead to intense bursts of star formation. Yet, the average enhancement in star formation rate (SFR) in major mergers and the contribution of such events to the cosmic SFR are not well estimated. Here we use photometric redshifts, stellar masses, and UV SFRs from COMBO-17, 24 μm SFRs from Spitzer, and morphologies from two deep Hubble Space Telescope (HST) cosmological survey fields (ECDFS/GEMS and A901/STAGES) to study the enhancement in SFR as a function of projected galaxy separation. We apply two-point projected correlation function techniques, which we augment with morphologically selected very close pairs (separation <2″) and merger remnants from the HST imaging. Our analysis confirms that the most intensely star-forming systems are indeed interacting or merging. Yet, for massive (M * ≥ 1010 M ⊙) star-forming galaxies at 0.4 < z < 0.8, we find that the SFRs of galaxies undergoing a major interaction (mass ratios ≤1:4 and separations ≤40 kpc) are only 1.80 ± 0.30 times higher than the SFRs of non-interacting galaxies when averaged over all interactions and all stages of the interaction, in good agreement with other observational works. Our results also agree with hydrodynamical simulations of galaxy interactions, which produce some mergers with large bursts of star formation on 100 Myr timescales, but only a modest SFR enhancement when averaged over the entire merger timescale. We demonstrate that these results imply that only ≲10% of star formation at 0.4 ≤ z ≤ 0.8 is triggered directly by major mergers and interactions; these events are not important factors in the build-up of stellar mass since z = 1. © 2009. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved..
Authors & Co-Authors
Bell, Eric F.
Germany, Heidelberg
Max Planck Institute for Astronomy
Skelton, Rosalind E.
Germany, Heidelberg
Max Planck Institute for Astronomy
McIntosh, Daniel H.
United States, Amherst
University of Massachusetts Amherst
United States, Kansas City
University of Missouri-kansas City
Somerville, Rachel S.
United States, Baltimore
Space Telescope Science Institute
Zheng, Xianzhong
China, Beijing
Chinese Academy of Sciences
Rix, Hans Walter R.
Germany, Heidelberg
Max Planck Institute for Astronomy
Bacon, David J.
United Kingdom, Portsmouth
University of Portsmouth
Balogh, Michael L.
Canada, Waterloo
University of Waterloo
Caldwell, John A.R.
United States, Austin
University of Texas System
Gallazzi, Anna R.
Germany, Heidelberg
Max Planck Institute for Astronomy
Gray, Meghan E.
United Kingdom, Nottingham
University of Nottingham
Häussler, Boris
United Kingdom, Nottingham
University of Nottingham
Heymans, Catherine E.
Canada, Vancouver
The University of British Columbia
Jahnke, Knud
Germany, Heidelberg
Max Planck Institute for Astronomy
Jogee, Shardha
United States, Austin
The University of Texas at Austin
van Kampen, Eelco V.
Austria, Innsbruck
Universität Innsbruck
Germany, Garching Bei Munchen
European Southern Observatory
Meisenheimer, Klauss
Germany, Heidelberg
Max Planck Institute for Astronomy
Papovich, Casey J.
United States, Tucson
The University of Arizona
Peng, Chien Y.
Canada, Ottawa
National Research Council Canada
Sánchez, Sebastián F.
Unknown Affiliation
Skibba, Ramin A.
Germany, Heidelberg
Max Planck Institute for Astronomy
Andrew Taylor, Andrew N.
United Kingdom, Edinburgh
The University of Edinburgh
Wisotzki, Lutz
Germany, Potsdam
Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam
Statistics
Citations: 104
Authors: 23
Affiliations: 19
Identifiers
Doi:
10.1088/0004-637X/704/1/324
ISSN:
0004637X
Study Design
Cross Sectional Study
Study Approach
Quantitative