IA/U.Lisboa Seminar - RemoveYoung: A tool for the removal of the young stellar component in galaxies (...) - 10 novembro 2016

The optical morphology of galaxies holds the cumulative record of their assembly history, and techniques for its quantitative characterization offer a promising avenue toward understanding galaxy formation and evolution. However, the morphology of star-forming galaxies is generally dictated by the youngest stellar component, which can readily overshine faint structural/morphological features in the older underlying stellar background (e.g., relics from recent minor mergers) that could hold important insights into the galaxy build-up process. Stripping off galaxy images from the emission from stellar populations younger than an adjustable age cutoff t_cut can therefore provide a valuable tool in extragalactic research.

RemoveYoung (RY), a publicly available tool presented in Gomes & Papaderos 2016 (A&A 594, A49), exploits the combined power of integral field spectroscopy (IFS) and spectral population synthesis (SPS) toward this goal.

Two-dimensional post-processing of SPS models to IFS data cubes with RY permits computation of the spectral energy, surface brightness, and stellar surface density distribution of stellar populations older than a user-defined t_cut.

This new technique invites to a variety of applications to star-forming galaxies, such as interacting or merging galaxy pairs and lower mass starburst galaxies near and far, such as blue compact and tidal dwarf galaxies. Some examples will be presented.

Observatório Astronómico de Lisboa (Seminar room)

Tapada da Ajuda, 1349-018 Lisboa