Cluster environments influence galaxy evolution by curtailing star formation activity, notably through ram-pressure stripping (RPS). This process can leave observable signatures - such as gas tails and truncated gas discs - that are crucial for understanding how RPS affects galaxies. In this study, using spatially resolved spectroscopic data from the SAMI Galaxy Survey, we identify galaxies undergoing or recently affected by RPS in eight nearby clusters (0.029
We explore the impact of the large-scale 3D density field, as defined by deep, wide-field galaxy surveys, on stellar spin (lambda(Re)) and the distributions of fast and slow rotators. We use the Galaxy And Mass Assembly spectroscopic redshift survey to reconstruct the cosmic web and obtain spatially resolved stellar kinematics from the SAMI (Sydney-AAO Multi-object Integral-field spectrograph) Galaxy Survey. Among various local and large-scale environment metrics, the distance to the closest filament (D-fil) correlates most significantly with lambda(Re), but it is secondary to the more dominant roles played by stellar age and mass. Fast rotators tend to have increasing lambda(Re) going from nodes to filaments to voids, independently of mass. Slow rotators and mass-matched fast rotators are found to have significantly different distributions of large-scale environment metrics but consistent distributions of local environment metrics. About 95 per cent of slow rotators have D-fil <= 2 Mpc, while covering broader ranges (similar to fast rotators) in distance to nodes and voids, local galaxy density, halo mass, and position with respect to the halo. At fixed mass, the fraction of slow rotators, f(SR), increases for smaller D-fil, especially for massive galaxies. While controlling for age or mass, only galaxies very close to filaments and nodes show a significant impact of local environment on f(SR). Our results demonstrate that the cosmic web leaves an imprint on galactic spin amplitudes, and that pre-processing by mergers occurring within filaments is likely to be an important physical mechanism for the formation of slow rotators before they reach nodes.
ABSTRACT We study environmental quenching in the eagle/c-eagle cosmological hydrodynamic simulations over the last 11 Gyr (i.e. z = 0–2). The simulations are compared with observations from the SAMI Galaxy Survey at z = 0. We focus on satellite galaxies in galaxy groups and clusters ($10^{12}\, {\rm M}_{\odot }$ ≲ M200 < $3 \times 10^{15}\, {\rm M}_{\odot }$). A star-formation concentration index [C-index = log10(r50, SFR/r50, rband)] is defined, which measures how concentrated star formation is relative to the stellar distribution. Both eagle/c-eagle and SAMI show a higher fraction of galaxies with low C-index in denser environments at z = 0–0.5. Low C-index galaxies are found below the SFR–M⋆ main sequence (MS), and display a declining specific star formation rate (sSFR) with increasing radii, consistent with ‘outside-in’ environmental quenching. Additionally, we show that C-index can be used as a proxy for how long galaxies have been satellites. These trends become weaker at increasing redshift and are absent by z = 1–2. We define a quenching time-scale tquench as how long it takes satellites to transition from the MS to the quenched population. We find that simulated galaxies experiencing ‘outside-in’ environmental quenching at low redshift (z = 0 ∼ 0.5) have a long quenching time-scale (median tquench > 2 Gyr). The simulated galaxies at higher redshift (z = 0.7 ∼ 2) experience faster quenching (median tquench < 2 Gyr). At z ≳ 1–2 galaxies undergoing environmental quenching have decreased sSFR across the entire galaxy with no ‘outside-in’ quenching signatures and a narrow range of C-index, showing that on average environmental quenching acts differently than at z ≲ 1.
ABSTRACT Galactic fountains driven by star formation result in a variety of kinematic structures such as ionized winds and thick gas discs, both of which manifest as complex emission-line profiles that can be parametrized by multiple Gaussian components. We use integral field spectroscopy from the SAMI Galaxy Survey to spectrally resolve these features, traced by broad ${\rm H}\alpha$ components, and distinguish them from the star-forming (SF) thin disc, traced by narrow components, in 3068 galaxies in the local Universe. Using a matched sample analysis technique, we demonstrate that the presence of complex emission-line profiles in SF galaxies is most strongly correlated with the global star formation rate (SFR) surface density of the host galaxy measured within 1Re ($\Sigma _{{\rm SFR},\, R_{\rm e}}$), even when controlling for both observational biases, including inclination, amplitude-to-noise and angular scale, and sample biases in parameters such as stellar mass and SFR. Leveraging the spatially resolved nature of the data set, we determine that the presence of complex emission-line profiles within individual spaxels is driven not only by the local ΣSFR, but by the $\Sigma _{{\rm SFR},\, R_{\rm e}}$ of the host galaxy. We also parametrize the clumpiness of the SFR within individual galaxies, and find that $\Sigma _{{\rm SFR},\, R_{\rm e}}$ is a stronger predictor of the presence of complex emission-line profiles than clumpiness. We conclude that, with a careful treatment of observational effects, it is possible to identify structures traced by complex emission-line profiles, including winds and thick ionized gas discs, at the spatial and spectral resolution of SAMI using the Gaussian decomposition technique.
ABSTRACT Misalignments between the rotation axis of stars and gas are an indication of external processes shaping galaxies throughout their evolution. Using observations of 3068 galaxies from the SAMI Galaxy Survey, we compute global kinematic position angles for 1445 objects with reliable kinematics and identify 169 (12 per cent) galaxies which show stellar-gas misalignments. Kinematically decoupled features are more prevalent in early-type/passive galaxies compared to late-type/star-forming systems. Star formation is the main source of gas ionization in only 22 per cent of misaligned galaxies; 17 per cent are Seyfert objects, while 61 per cent show Low-Ionization Nuclear Emission-line Region features. We identify the most probable physical cause of the kinematic decoupling and find that, while accretion-driven cases are dominant, for up to 8 per cent of our sample, the misalignment may be tracing outflowing gas. When considering only misalignments driven by accretion, the acquired gas is feeding active star formation in only ∼1/4 of cases. As a population, misaligned galaxies have higher Sérsic indices and lower stellar spin and specific star formation rates than appropriately matched samples of aligned systems. These results suggest that both morphology and star formation/gas content are significantly correlated with the prevalence and timescales of misalignments. Specifically, torques on misaligned gas discs are smaller for more centrally concentrated galaxies, while the newly accreted gas feels lower viscous drag forces in more gas-poor objects. Marginal evidence of star formation not being correlated with misalignment likelihood for late-type galaxies suggests that such morphologies in the nearby Universe might be the result of preferentially aligned accretion at higher redshifts.
ABSTRACT The stellar surface density within the inner 1 kpc (Σ1) has become a popular tool for understanding the growth of galaxies and its connection with the quenching of star formation. The emerging picture suggests that building a central dense core is a necessary condition for quenching. However, it is not clear whether changes in Σ1 trace changes in stellar kinematics and the growth of dispersion-dominated bulges. In this paper, we combine imaging from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey with stellar kinematics from the Sydney-AAO Multi-object Integral-field unit and Mapping Nearby Galaxies at Apache Point Observatory surveys to quantify the correlation between Σ1 and the proxy for stellar spin parameter within one effective radius (λre) for 1599 nearby galaxies. We show that, on the star-forming main sequence and at fixed stellar mass, changes in Σ1 are mirrored by changes in λre. While forming stars, main-sequence galaxies remain rotationally-dominated systems, with their Σ1 increasing but their stellar spin staying either constant or slightly increasing. The picture changes below the main sequence, where Σ1 and λre are no longer correlated. Passive systems show a narrower range of Σ1, but a wider range of λre compared to star-forming galaxies. Our results indicate that, from a structural point of view, passive galaxies are a more heterogeneous population than star-forming systems, and may have followed a variety of evolutionary paths. This also suggests that, if dispersion-dominated bulges still grow significantly at z ∼ 0, this generally takes place during, or after, the quenching phase.
The combination of gas-phase oxygen abundances and stellar metallicities can provide us with unique insights into the metal enrichment histories of galaxies. In this work, we compare the stellar and gas-phase metallicities measured within a 1$R_{e}$ aperture for a representative sample of 472 star-forming galaxies extracted from the SAMI Galaxy Survey. We confirm that the stellar and interstellar medium (ISM) metallicities are strongly correlated, with scatter $\sim$3 times smaller than that found in previous works, and that integrated stellar populations are generally more metal-poor than the ISM, especially in low-mass galaxies. The ratio between the two metallicities strongly correlates with several integrated galaxy properties including stellar mass, specific star formation rate, and a gravitational potential proxy. However, we show that these trends are primarily a consequence of: (a) the different star formation and metal enrichment histories of the galaxies, and (b) the fact that while stellar metallicities trace primarily iron enrichment, gas-phase metallicity indicators are calibrated to the enrichment of oxygen in the ISM. Indeed, once both metallicities are converted to the same `element base' all of our trends become significantly weaker. Interestingly, the ratio of gas to stellar metallicity is always below the value expected for a simple closed-box model, which requires that outflows and inflows play an important role in the enrichment history across our entire stellar mass range. This work highlights the complex interplay between stellar and gas-phase metallicities and shows how care must be taken in comparing them to constrain models of galaxy formation and evolution.
ABSTRACT We perform a joint analysis of high spatial resolution molecular gas and star-formation rate (SFR) maps in main-sequence star-forming galaxies experiencing galactic-scale outflows of ionized gas. Our aim is to understand the mechanism that determines which galaxies are able to launch these intense winds. We observed CO(1→0) at 1-arcsec resolution with ALMA in 16 edge-on galaxies, which also have 2-arcsec spatial-resolution optical integral field observations from the SAMI Galaxy Survey. Half the galaxies in the sample were previously identified as harbouring intense and large-scale outflows of ionized gas (‘outflow types’) and the rest serve as control galaxies. The data set is complemented by integrated CO(1→0) observations from the IRAM 30-m telescope to probe the total molecular gas reservoirs. We find that the galaxies powering outflows do not possess significantly different global gas fractions or star-formation efficiencies when compared with a control sample. However, the ALMA maps reveal that the molecular gas in the outflow-type galaxies is distributed more centrally than in the control galaxies. For our outflow-type objects, molecular gas and star-formation are largely confined within their inner effective radius (reff), whereas in the control sample, the distribution is more diffuse, extending far beyond reff. We infer that outflows in normal star-forming galaxies may be caused by dynamical mechanisms that drive molecular gas into their central regions, which can result in locally enhanced gas surface density and star-formation.
The role of the environment on the formation of S0 galaxies is still not well understood, specifically in the outskirts of galaxy clusters. We study eight low-redshift clusters, analyzing galaxy members up to cluster-centric distances of ∼2.5 R 200 . We perform 2D photometric bulge–disk decomposition in the g , r , and i bands from which we identify 469 double-component galaxies. We separately analyze the colors of the bulges and disks and their dependence on the projected cluster-centric distance and local galaxy density. For our sample of cluster S0 galaxies, we find that bulges are redder than their surrounding disks, show a significant color–magnitude trend, and have colors that do not correlate with environment metrics. On the other hand, the disks associated with our cluster S0s become significantly bluer with increasing cluster-centric radius but show no evidence for a color–magnitude relation. The disk color–radius relation is mainly driven by galaxies in the cluster core at 0 ≤ R / R 200 < 0.5. No significant difference is found for the disk colors of backsplash and infalling galaxies in the projected phase space (PPS). Beyond R 200 , the disk colors do not change with the local galaxy density, indicating that the colors of double-component galaxies are not affected by preprocessing. A significant color–density relation is observed for single-component disk-dominated galaxies beyond R 200 . We conclude that the formation of cluster S0 galaxies is primarily driven by cluster core processes acting on the disks, while evidence of preprocessing is found for single-component disk-dominated galaxies. We publicly release the data from the bulge–disk decomposition.
ABSTRACT Galaxy internal structure growth has long been accused of inhibiting star formation in disc galaxies. We investigate the potential physical connection between the growth of dispersion-supported stellar structures (e.g. classical bulges) and the position of galaxies on the star-forming main sequence at z ∼ 0. Combining the might of the SAMI and MaNGA galaxy surveys, we measure the λRe spin parameter for 3289 galaxies over $9.5 \lt \log M_{\star } [\rm {M}_{\odot }] \lt 12$. At all stellar masses, galaxies at the locus of the main sequence possess λRe values indicative of intrinsically flattened discs. However, above $\log M_{\star }[\rm {M}_{\odot }]\sim 10.5$ where the main sequence starts bending, we find tantalizing evidence for an increase in the number of galaxies with dispersion-supported structures, perhaps suggesting a connection between bulges and the bending of the main sequence. Moving above the main sequence, we see no evidence of any change in the typical spin parameter in galaxies once gravitationally interacting systems are excluded from the sample. Similarly, up to 1 dex below the main sequence, λRe remains roughly constant and only at very high stellar masses ($\log M_{\star }[\rm {M}_{\odot }]\gt 11$), do we see a rapid decrease in λRe once galaxies decline in star formation activity. If this trend is confirmed, it would be indicative of different quenching mechanisms acting on high- and low-mass galaxies. The results suggest that whilst a population of galaxies possessing some dispersion-supported structure is already present on the star-forming main sequence, further growth would be required after the galaxy has quenched to match the kinematic properties observed in passive galaxies at z ∼ 0.
We use comparisons between the Sydney-AAO Multi-object Integral Field Spectrograph (SAMI) Galaxy Survey and equilibrium galaxy models to infer the importance of disc fading in the transition of spirals into lenticular (S0) galaxies. The local S0 population has both higher photometric concentration and lower stellar spin than spiral galaxies of comparable mass and we test whether this separation can be accounted for by passive aging alone. We construct a suite of dynamically self-consistent galaxy models, with a bulge, disc, and halo using the galactics code. The dispersion-dominated bulge is given a uniformly old stellar population, while the disc is given a current star formation rate putting it on the main sequence, followed by sudden instantaneous quenching. We then generate mock observables (r-band images, stellar velocity, and dispersion maps) as a function of time since quenching for a range of bulge/total (B/T) mass ratios. The disc fading leads to a decline in measured spin as the bulge contribution becomes more dominant, and also leads to increased concentration. However, the quantitative changes observed after 5 Gyr of disc fading cannot account for all of the observed difference. We see similar results if we instead subdivide our SAMI Galaxy Survey sample by star formation (relative to the main sequence). We use EAGLE simulations to also take into account progenitor bias, using size evolution to infer quenching time. The EAGLE simulations suggest that the progenitors of current passive galaxies typically have slightly higher spin than present day star-forming disc galaxies of the same mass. As a result, progenitor bias moves the data further from the disc fading model scenario, implying that intrinsic dynamical evolution must be important in the transition from star-forming discs to passive discs.
We explore stellar population properties separately in the bulge and the disk of double-component cluster galaxies, to shed light on the formation of lenticular galaxies in dense environments. We study eight low-redshift clusters from the Sydney-AAO Multi-object Integral field Galaxy Survey, using two-dimensional photometric bulge-disk decomposition in the g, r, and i bands to characterize galaxies. For 192 double-component galaxies with M-* > 10(10) M-circle dot, we estimate the color, age, and metallicity of the bulge and the disk. The analysis of the g - i colors reveals that bulges are redder than their surrounding disks, with a median offset of 0.12 +/- 0.02 mag, consistent with previous results. To measure mass-weighted age and metallicity, we investigate three methods: (i) one based on galaxy stellar mass weights for the two components, (ii) one based on flux weights, and (iii) one based on radial separation. The three methods agree in finding 62% of galaxies having bulges that are 2-3 times more metal-rich than the disks. Of the remaining galaxies, 7% have bulges that are more metal-poor than the disks, while for 31%, the bulge and disk metallicities are not significantly different. We observe 23% of galaxies being characterized by bulges older and 34% by bulges younger with respect to the disks. The remaining 43% of galaxies have bulges and disks with statistically indistinguishable ages. Redder bulges tend to be more metal-rich than the disks, suggesting that the redder color in bulges is due to their enhanced metallicity relative to the disks instead of differences in stellar population age.
Large galaxy samples from multi-object IFS surveys now allow for a statistical analysis of the z~0 galaxy population using resolved kinematics. However, the improvement in number statistics comes at a cost, with multi-object IFS surveys more severely impacted by the effect of seeing and lower signal-to-noise. We present an analysis of ~1800 galaxies from the SAMI Galaxy Survey and investigate the spread and overlap in the kinematic distributions of the spin parameter proxy $\lambda_{Re}$ as a function of stellar mass and ellipticity. For SAMI data, the distributions of galaxies identified as regular and non-regular rotators with $kinemetry$ show considerable overlap in the $\lambda_{Re}$-$\varepsilon_e$ diagram. In contrast, visually classified galaxies (obvious and non-obvious rotators) are better separated in $\lambda_{Re}$ space, with less overlap of both distributions. Then, we use a Bayesian mixture model to analyse the $\lambda_{Re}$-$\log(M_*/M_{\odot})$ distribution. As a function of mass, we investigate whether the data are best fit with a single kinematic distribution or with two. Below $\log(M_*/M_{\odot})$~10.5 a single beta distribution is sufficient to fit the complete $\lambda_{Re}$ distribution, whereas a second beta distribution is required above $\log(M_*/M_{\odot})$~10.5 to account for a population of low-$\lambda_{Re}$ galaxies, presenting the cleanest separation of the two populations. We apply the same analysis to mock-observations from cosmological simulations. The mixture model predicts a bimodal $\lambda_{Re}$ distribution for all simulations, albeit with different positions of the $\lambda_{Re}$ peaks and with different ratios of both populations. Our analysis validates the conclusions from previous, smaller IFS surveys, but also demonstrates the importance of using kinematic selection criteria that are dictated by the quality of the observed or simulated data.
ABSTRACT We present the first detection of mass-dependent galactic spin alignments with local cosmic filaments with >2σ confidence using IFS kinematics. The 3D network of cosmic filaments is reconstructed on Mpc scales across GAlaxy and Mass Assembly fields using the cosmic web extractor DisPerSe. We assign field galaxies from the SAMI survey to their nearest filament segment in 3D and estimate the degree of alignment between SAMI galaxies’ kinematic spin axis and their nearest filament in projection. Low-mass galaxies align their spin with their nearest filament while higher mass counterparts are more likely to display an orthogonal orientation. The stellar transition mass from the first trend to the second is bracketed between $10^{10.4}$ and $10^{10.9}\, \mathrm{ M}_{\odot }$, with hints of an increase with filament scale. Consistent signals are found in the Horizon-AGN cosmological hydrodynamic simulation. This supports a scenario of early angular momentum build-up in vorticity rich quadrants around filaments at low stellar mass followed by progressive flip of spins orthogonal to the cosmic filaments through mergers at high stellar mass. Conversely, we show that dark matter only simulations post-processed with a semi-analytical model treatment of galaxy formation struggles to reproduce this alignment signal. This suggests that gas physics is key in enhancing the galaxy-filament alignment.
At fixed stellar mass, satellite galaxies show higher passive fractions than centrals, suggesting that environment is directly quenching their star formation. Here, we investigate whether satellite quenching is accompanied by changes in stellar spin (quantified by the ratio of the rotational to dispersion velocity V/sigma for a sample of massive (M* > 10(10) M-circle dot) satellite galaxies extracted from the Sydney-AAO Multi-object Integral field spectrograph (SAMI) Galaxy Survey. These systems are carefully matched to a control sample of main sequence, high V/s central galaxies. As expected, at fixed stellar mass and ellipticity, satellites have lower star formation rate (SFR) and spin than the control centrals. However, most of the difference is in SFR, whereas the spin decreases significantly only for satellites that have already reached the red sequence. We perform a similar analysis for galaxies in the Evolution and Assembly of GaLaxies and their Environments (EAGLE) hydrodynamical simulation and recover differences in both SFR and spin similar to those observed in SAMI. However, when EAGLE satellites are matched to their true central progenitors, the change in spin is further reduced and galaxies mainly show a decrease in SFR during their satellite phase. The difference in spin observed between satellites and centrals at z similar to 0 is primarily due to the fact that satellites do not grow their angular momentum as fast as centrals after accreting into bigger haloes, not to a reduction of V/s due to environmental effects. Our findings highlight the effect of progenitor bias in our understanding of galaxy transformation and they suggest that satellites undergo little structural change before and during their quenching phase.
Misalignment of gas and stellar rotation in galaxies can give clues to the origin and processing of accreted gas. Integral field spectroscopic observations of 1213 galaxies from the SAMI Galaxy Survey show that 11% of galaxies with fitted gas and stellar rotation are misaligned by more than 30 degrees in both field/group and cluster environments. Using SAMI morphological classifications and Sersic indices, the misalignment fraction is 45+/-6% in early-type galaxies, but only 5+/-1% in late-type galaxies. The distribution of position angle offsets is used to test the physical drivers of this difference. Slower dynamical settling time of the gas in elliptical stellar mass distributions accounts for a small increase in misalignment in early-type galaxies. However, gravitational dynamical settling time is insufficient to fully explain the observed differences between early- and late-type galaxies in the distributions of the gas/stellar position angle offsets. LTGs have primarily accreted gas close to aligned rather than settled from misaligned based on analysis of the skewed distribution of PA offsets compared to a dynamical settling model. Local environment density is less important in setting the misalignment fractions than morphology, suggesting that mergers are not the main source of accreted gas in these disks. Cluster environments are found to have gas misalignment driven primarily by cluster processes not by gas accretion.
We construct Tully-Fisher relations (TFRs), from large samples of galaxies with spatially-resolved H alpha emission maps from the K-band Multi-Object Spectrograph (KMOS) Redshift One Spectroscopic Survey (KROSS) at z approximate to 1. We compare these to data from the Sydney-Australian-Astronomical-Observatory Multi-object Integral-Field Spectrograph (SAMI) Galaxy Survey at z approximate to 0. We stringently match the data quality of the latter to the former, and apply identical analysis methods and sub-sample selection criteria to both to conduct a direct comparison of the absolute K-band magnitude and stellar mass TFRs at z approximate to 1 and 0. We find that matching the quality of the SAMI data to that of KROSS results in TFRs that differ significantly in slope, zero-point and (sometimes) scatter in comparison to the corresponding original SAMI relations. These differences are in every case as large or larger than the differences between the KROSS z approximate to 1 and matched SAMI z approximate to 0 relations. Accounting for these differences, we compare the TFRs at z approximate to 1 and 0. For disk-like, star-forming galaxies we find no significant difference in the TFR zero-points between the two epochs. This suggests the growth of stellar mass and dark matter in these types of galaxies is intimately linked over this approximate to 8 Gyr period.
We present a detailed exploration of the stellar mass versus gas-phase metallicity relation (MZR) using integral field spectroscopy data obtained from similar to 1000 galaxies observed by the SAMI galaxy survey. 'These spatially resolved spectroscopic data allow us to determine the metallicity within the same physical scale (R-eff) for different calibrators. The shape of the MZ relations is very similar between the different calibrators, while there are large offsets in the absolute values of the abundances. We confirm our previous results derived using the spatially resolved data provided by the CALIFA and MaNGA surveys: (1) we do not find any significant secondary relation of the MZR with either the star formation rate (SFR) or the specific SFR (SFR/M.) for any of the calibrators used in this study, based on the analysis of the individual residuals; (2) if there is a dependence with the SFR, it is weaker than the reported one (r(c)similar to -0.3), it is confined to the low-mass regime (M-* < 10(9) M-circle dot) or high-SFR regimes, and it does not produce any significant improvement in the description of the average population of galaxies. The aparent disagreement with published results based on single-fibre spectroscopic data could be due to (i) the interpretation of the secondary relation itself; (ii) the lower number of objects sampled at the low-mass regime by the current study; or (iii) the presence of extreme star-forming galaxies that drive the secondary relation in previous results.