arXiv subjects

Andrea Borch

Publications and source records attributed to Andrea Borch.

15 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2013

MegaMorph -- multi-wavelength measurement of galaxy structure: Sérsic profile fits to galaxies near and far

We demonstrate a new multi-wavelength technique for two-dimensional parametric modelling of galaxy surface-brightness profiles, which we have incorporated into the widely used software GALFIT. Our new method, named GALFITM, extends GALFIT3's current single-band fitting process by simultaneously using multiple images of the same galaxy to constrain a wavelength-dependent model. Each standard profile parameter may vary as a function of wavelength, with a user-definable degree of smoothness, from constant to fully free. The performance of GALFITM is evaluated by fitting elliptical Sérsic profiles to ugriz imaging data for 4026 galaxies, comprising the original SDSS imaging for 163 low redshift (v < 7000 kms) galaxies and 3863 artificially redshifted (0.01 < z < 0.25) images of the same galaxies. Comparing results from single-band and multi-band techniques, we show that GALFITM significantly improves the extraction of information, particularly from bands with low signal-to-noise ratio (e.g., u and z SDSS bands) when combined with higher signal-to-noise images. We also study systematic trends in the recovered parameters, particularly Sérsic index, that appear when one performs measurements of the same galaxies at successively higher redshifts. We argue that it is vital that studies investigating the evolution of galaxy structure are careful to avoid or correct for these biases. The resulting multi-band photometric structural parameters for our sample of 163 galaxies are provided. We demonstrate the importance of considering multi-band measurements by showing that the Sérsic indices of spiral galaxies increase to redder wavelengths, as expected for composite bulge-disk systems. Finally, for the ellipticals in our sample, which should be well-represented by single-Sérsic models, we compare our measured parameters to those from previous studies.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2009

History of Galaxy Interactions and their Impact on Star Formation over the Last 7 Gyr from GEMS

We perform a comprehensive estimate of the frequency of galaxy mergers and their impact on star formation over z~0.24--0.80 (lookback time T_b~3--7 Gyr) using 3698 (M*>=1e9 Msun) galaxies with GEMS HST, COMBO-17, and Spitzer data. Our results are: (1) Among 790 high mass (M*>=2.5e10 Msun) galaxies, the visually-based merger fraction over z~0.24--0.80, ranges from 9%+-5% to 8%+-2%. Lower limits on the major and minor merger fractions over this interval range from 1.1% to 3.5%, and 3.6% to 7.5%, respectively. This is the first approximate empirical estimate of the frequency of minor mergers at z<1. For a visibility timescale of ~0.5 Gyr, it follows that over T_b~3--7 Gyr, ~68% of high mass systems have undergone a merger of mass ratio >1/10, with ~16%, 45%, and 7% of these corresponding respectively to major, minor, and ambiguous `major or minor' mergers. The mean merger rate is a few x 1e-4 Gyr-1 Mpc-3. (2) We compare the empirical merger fraction and rate for high mass galaxies to a suite of Lambda CDM-based models: halo occupation distribution models, semi-analytic models, and hydrodynamic SPH simulations. We find qualitative agreement between observations and models such that the (major+minor) merger fraction or rate from different models bracket the observations, and show a factor of five dispersion. Near-future improvements can now start to rule out certain merger scenarios. (3) Among ~3698 M*>=1e9 Msun galaxies, we find that the mean SFR of visibly merging systems is only modestly enhanced compared to non-interacting galaxies over z~0.24--0.80. Visibly merging systems only account for less than 30% of the cosmic SFR density over T_b~3--7 Gyr. This suggests that the behavior of the cosmic SFR density over the last 7 Gyr is predominantly shaped by non-interacting galaxies.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2007

An Explanation for the Observed Weak Size Evolution of Disk Galaxies

Surveys of distant galaxies with the Hubble Space Telescope and from the ground have shown that there is only mild evolution in the relationship between radial size and stellar mass for galactic disks from z~1 to the present day. Using a sample of nearby disk-dominated galaxies from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), and high redshift data from the GEMS (Galaxy Evolution from Morphology and SEDs) survey, we investigate whether this result is consistent with theoretical expectations within the hierarchical paradigm of structure formation. The relationship between virial radius and mass for dark matter halos in the LCDM model evolves by about a factor of two over this interval. However, N-body simulations have shown that halos of a given mass have less centrally concentrated mass profiles at high redshift. When we compute the expected disk size-stellar mass distribution, accounting for this evolution in the internal structure of dark matter halos and the adiabatic contraction of the dark matter by the self-gravity of the collapsing baryons, we find that the predicted evolution in the mean size at fixed stellar mass since z~1 is about 15-20 percent, in good agreement with the observational constraints from GEMS. At redshift z~2, the model predicts that disks at fixed stellar mass were on average only 60% as large as they are today. Similarly, we predict that the rotation velocity at a given stellar mass (essentially the zero-point of the Tully-Fisher relation) is only about 10 percent larger at z~1 (20 percent at z~2) than at the present day.

astro-ph↗

arXiv2007

GEMS: Galaxy fitting catalogues and testing parametric galaxy fitting codes

In the context of measuring structure and morphology of intermediate redshift galaxies with recent HST/ACS surveys, we tune, test, and compare two widely used fitting codes (GALFIT and GIM2D) for fitting single-component Sersic models to the light profiles of both simulated and real galaxy data. We find that fitting accuracy depends sensitively on galaxy profile shape. Exponential disks are well fit with Sersic models and have small measurement errors, whereas fits to de Vaucouleurs profiles show larger uncertainties owing to the large amount of light at large radii. We find that both codes provide reliable fits and little systematic error, when the effective surface brightness is above that of the sky. Moreover, both codes return errors that significantly underestimate the true fitting uncertainties, which are best estimated with simulations. We find that GIM2D suffers significant systematic errors for spheroids with close companions owing to the difficulty of effectively masking out neighboring galaxy light; there appears to be no work around to this important systematic in GIM2D's current implementation. While this crowding error affects only a small fraction of galaxies in GEMS, it must be accounted for in the analysis of deeper cosmological images or of more crowded fields with GIM2D. In contrast, GALFIT results are robust to the presence of neighbors because it can simultaneously fit the profiles of multiple companions thereby deblending their effect on the fit to the galaxy of interest. We find GALFIT's robustness to nearby companions and factor of >~20 faster runtime speed are important advantages over GIM2D for analyzing large HST/ACS datasets. Finally we include our final catalog of fit results for all 41,495 objects detected in GEMS.

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arXiv2007

NBODY meets stellar population - The HYDE-PARC Project

N-body simulations give us a rough idea of how the shape of a simulated object appears in three-dimensional space. From an observational point of view this may give us a misleading picture. The faint stars may be the most common stars in the system but the morphological information obtained by observations of an object may be dominated by the color properties of the bright stars. Due to dynamical effects, such as energy equipartition, different masses of stars may populate different regions in the object. Since stars are evolving in mass the stellar evolution may also influence the dynamics of the system. Hence, if one is interested in simulating what the morphology will look like through a telescope, one needs to simulate in addition evolving stars and weight them by their luminosity. Therefore we need to combine simulations of the dynamical evolution and a stellar population synthesis at the same time. For the dynamical evolution part we use a parallel version of a direct N-body code, NBODY6++. This code also includes stellar evolution. We link the parameters from this stellar evolution routine to the BaSeL 2.0 stellar library. For isolated clusters we found results assimilable to standard stellar population synthesis codes such as the PEGASE code. For clusters in a tidal field we found that the integrated colors become relatively bluer due to energy equipartition effects. In the time shortly before dissolution of the cluster the stellar M/L ratio becomes lower compared to isolated clusters. We compared the results of our simulations to integrated spectra of galactic globular clusters. For the cluster NGC 1851 we found good agreement between simulation and observation. For extragalactic clusters in M81 and M31 we looked at medium band spectral energy distributions and found for some clusters also a good agreement.

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arXiv2007

Star Formation and the Growth of Stellar Mass

Recent observations have demonstrated a significant growth in the integrated stellar mass of the red sequence since z=1, dominated by a steadily increasing number of galaxies with stellar masses M* < 10^11 M_sun. In this paper, we use the COMBO-17 photometric redshift survey in conjunction with deep Spitzer 24 micron data to explore the relationship between star formation and the growth of stellar mass. We calculate `star formation rate functions' in four different redshift slices, splitting also into contributions from the red sequence and blue cloud for the first time. We find that the growth of stellar mass since z=1 is consistent with the integrated star formation rate. Yet, most of the stars formed are in blue cloud galaxies. If the stellar mass already in, and formed in, z<1 blue cloud galaxies were to stay in the blue cloud the total stellar mass in blue galaxies would be dramatically overproduced. We explore the expected evolution of stellar mass functions, finding that in this picture the number of massive M* > 3x10^10 M_sun blue galaxies would also be overproduced; i.e., most of the new stars formed in blue cloud galaxies are in the massive galaxies. We explore a simple truncation scenario in which these `extra' blue galaxies have their star formation suppressed by an unspecified mechanism or mechanisms; simple cessation of star formation in these extra blue galaxies is approximately sufficient to build up the red sequence at M*<10^11 M_sun.

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arXiv2006

The merger rate of massive galaxies

We calculate the projected two point correlation function for samples of luminous and massive galaxies in the COMBO-17 photometric redshift survey, focusing particularly on the amplitude of the correlation function at small projected radii and exploring the constraints such measurements can place on the galaxy merger rate. For nearly volume-limited samples with 0.4 2.5e10 M_sun is 5+/-1%. Incorporating close pair fractions from the literature, the 2dFGRS and the SDSS, we find a fairly rapid evolution of the merger fraction of massive galaxies between z=0.8 and the present day. Assuming that the major merger timescale is of order the dynamical timescale for close massive galaxy pairs, we tentatively infer that ~50% (70%) of all galaxies with present-day masses M_*>5e10 M_sun (remnants of mergers between galaxies with M_*>2.5e10 M_sun) have undergone a major merger since z=0.8(1): major mergers between massive galaxies are a significant driver of galaxy evolution over the last eight billion years.

astro-ph↗

arXiv2006

A weak lensing estimate from GEMS of the virial to stellar mass ratio in massive galaxies to z~0.8

We present constraints on the evolution of the virial to stellar mass ratio of galaxies with high stellar masses in the redshift range 0.2 10.5, where the majority show an early-type morphology, we find that the virial mass to stellar mass ratio is given by M_vir/M_star = 53^{+13}_{-16}. Assuming a baryon fraction from the concordance cosmology, this corresponds to a stellar fraction of baryons in massive galaxies of Omega_b^*/Ω_b = 0.10 +/- 0.03. Analysing the galaxy sample in different redshift slices, we find little or no evolution in the virial to stellar mass ratio, and place an upper limit of ~2.5 on the growth of massive galaxies through the conversion of gas into stars from z=0.8 to the present day.

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arXiv2006

The stellar masses of 25000 galaxies at 0.2<z<1.0 estimated by the COMBO-17 survey

We present an analysis of stellar mass estimates for a sample of 25000 galaxies from the COMBO-17 survey over the interval 0.2 60%) of massive galaxies with M_* > 10^{11} solar masses at all z<1 are non-star-forming; blue star-forming galaxies dominate at lower masses. We have used these mass estimates to explore the evolution of the stellar mass function since z=1. We find that the total stellar mass density of the universe has roughly doubled since z~1. Our measurements are consistent with other measurements of the growth of stellar mass with cosmic time and with estimates of the time evolution of the cosmic star formation rate. Intriguingly, the integrated stellar mass of blue galaxies with young stars has not significantly changed since z~1, even though these galaxies host the majority of the star formation: instead, the growth of the total stellar mass density is dominated by the growth of the total mass in the largely passive galaxies on the red sequence.

astro-ph↗

arXiv2005

Dry Mergers in GEMS: The Dynamical Evolution of Massive Early-Type Galaxies

We have used the 28'x 28' HST image mosaic from the GEMS (Galaxy Evolution from Morphology and SEDs) survey in conjunction with the COMBO-17 photometric redshift survey to constrain the incidence of major mergers between spheroid-dominated galaxies with little cold gas (dry mergers) since z = 0.7. A set of N-body merger simulations was used to explore the morphological signatures of such interactions: they are recognizable either as < 5kpc separation close pairs or because of broad, low surface brightness tidal features and asymmetries. Data with the depth and resolution of GEMS are sensitive to dry mergers between galaxies with M_V < -20.5 for z < 0.7; dry mergers at higher redshifts are not easily recovered in single-orbit HST imaging. Six dry mergers (12 galaxies) with luminosity ratios between 1:1 and 4:1 were found from a sample of 379 red early-type galaxies with M_V < -20.5 and 0.1 < z < 0.7. The simulations suggest that the morphological signatures of dry merging are visible for ~250Myr and we use this timescale to convert the observed merger incidence into a rate. On this basis we find that present day spheroidal galaxies with M_V < -20.5 on average have undergone between 0.5 and 2 major dry mergers since z ~ 0.7. We have compared this result with the predictions of a Cold Dark Matter based semi-analytic galaxy formation model. The model reproduces the observed declining major merger fraction of bright galaxies and the space density of luminous early-type galaxies reasonably well. The predicted dry merger fraction is consistent with our observational result. Hence, hierarchical models predict and observations now show that major dry mergers are an important driver of the evolution of massive early-type galaxies in recent epochs.

astro-ph↗

arXiv2005

Cosmological weak lensing with the HST GEMS survey

We present our cosmic shear analysis of GEMS, one of the largest wide-field surveys ever undertaken by the Hubble Space Telescope. Imaged with the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS), GEMS spans 795 square arcmin in the Chandra Deep Field South. We detect weak lensing by large-scale structure in high resolution F606W GEMS data from ~60 resolved galaxies per square arcminute. We measure the two-point shear correlation function, the top-hat shear variance and the shear power spectrum, performing an E/B mode decomposition for each statistic. We show that we are not limited by systematic errors and use our results to place joint constraints on the matter density parameter Omega_m and the amplitude of the matter power spectrum sigma_8. We find sigma_8(Omega_m/0.3)^{0.65}=0.68 +/- 0.13 where the 1sigma error includes both our uncertainty on the median redshift of the survey and sampling variance. Removing image and point spread function (PSF) distortions are crucial to all weak lensing analyses. We therefore include a thorough discussion on the degree of ACS PSF distortion and anisotropy which we characterise directly from GEMS data. Consecutively imaged over 20 days, GEMS data also allows us to investigate PSF instability over time. We find that, even in the relatively short GEMS observing period, the ACS PSF ellipticity varies at the level of a few percent which we account for with a semi-time dependent PSF model. Our correction for the temporal and spatial variability of the PSF is shown to be successful through a series of diagnostic tests.

astro-ph↗

arXiv2005

GEMS: The Size Evolution of Disk Galaxies

We combine HST imaging from the GEMS survey with photometric redshifts from COMBO-17 to explore the evolution of disk-dominated galaxies since z<1.1. The sample is comprised of all GEMS galaxies with Sersic indices n<2.5, derived from fits to the galaxy images. We account fully for selection effects through careful analysis of image simulations; we are limited by the depth of the redshift and HST data to the study of galaxies with absolute magnitudes M(V)<-20, or equivalently stellar masses log(M)>10. We find strong evolution in the magnitude-size scaling relation for galaxies with M(V)<-20, corresponding to a brightening of 1 mag per sqarcsec in rest-frame V-band by z=1. Yet, disks at a given absolute magnitude are bluer and have lower stellar mass-to-light ratios at z=1 than at the present day. As a result, our findings indicate weak or no evolution in the relation between stellar mass and effective disk size for galaxies with log(M)>10 over the same time interval. This is strongly inconsistent with the most naive theoretical expectation, in which disk size scales in proportion to the halo virial radius, which would predict that disks are a factor of two denser at fixed mass at z=1. The lack of evolution in the stellar mass-size relation is consistent with an ``inside-out'' growth of galaxy disks on average (galaxies increasing in size as they grow more massive), although we cannot rule out more complex evolutionary scenarios.

astro-ph↗

arXiv2004

The Evolution of Early-type Red Galaxies with the GEMS Survey: Luminosity-size and Stellar Mass-size Relations Since z=1

We combine HST/ACS imaging from the GEMS survey with redshifts and rest-frame quantities from COMBO-17 to study the evolution of morphologically early-type galaxies with red colors since z=1. We use a new large sample of 728 galaxies with centrally-concentrated radial profiles (Sersic n>2.5) and rest-frame U-V colors on the red sequence. By appropriate comparison with the local relations from SDSS, we find that the luminosity-size (L-R) and stellar mass-size (M-R) relations evolve in a manner that is consistent with the passive aging of ancient stars. By itself, this result is consistent with a completely passive evolution of the red early-type galaxy population. If instead, as demonstrated by a number of recent surveys, the early-type galaxy population builds up in mass by a factor of 2 since z=1, our results imply that new additions to the early-type galaxy population follow similar L-R and M-R correlations, compared to the older subset of early-type galaxies. Adding early-type galaxies to the red sequence through disk fading appears to be consistent with the data. Through comparison with models, the role of dissipationless merging is limited to <1 major merger on average since z=1 for the most massive galaxies. Predictions from models of gas-rich mergers are not yet mature enough to allow a detailed comparison to our observations. We find tentative evidence that the amount of luminosity evolution depends on galaxy stellar mass, such that the least massive galaxies show stronger luminosity evolution compared to more massive early types. This could reflect a different origin of low-mass early-type galaxies and/or younger stellar populations; the present data is insufficient to discriminate between these possibilities. (abridged)

astro-ph↗

arXiv2004

Nearly 5000 Distant Early-Type Galaxies in COMBO-17: a Red Sequence and its Evolution since z~1

We present the rest-frame colors and luminosities of ~25000 m_R<24 galaxies in the redshift range 0.2<z<1.1, drawn from 0.78 square degrees of the COMBO-17 survey. We find that the rest-frame color distribution of these galaxies is bimodal at all redshifts out to z~1. This bimodality permits a model-independent definition of red, early-type galaxies and blue, late-type galaxies at any given redshift. The colors of the blue peak become redder towards the present day, and the number density of blue luminous galaxies has dropped strongly since z~1. Focusing on the red galaxies, we find that they populate a color-magnitude relation. Such red sequences have been identified in galaxy cluster environments, but our data show that such a sequence exists over this redshift range even when averaging over all environments. The mean color of the red galaxy sequence evolves with redshift in a way that is consistent with the aging of an ancient stellar population. The rest-frame B-band luminosity density in red galaxies evolves only mildly with redshift in a Lambda-dominated cold dark matter universe. Accounting for the change in stellar mass-to-light ratio implied by the redshift evolution in red galaxy colors, the COMBO-17 data indicate an increase in stellar mass on the red sequence by a factor of two since z~1. The largest source of uncertainty is large-scale structure, implying that considerably larger surveys are necessary to further refine this result. We explore mechanisms that may drive this evolution in the red galaxy population, finding that both galaxy merging and truncation of star formation in some fraction of the blue, star-forming population are required to fully explain the properties of these galaxies.

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arXiv2003

GEMS Imaging of Red Sequence Galaxies at z~0.7: Dusty or Old?

We have used the 30'x30' Hubble Space Telescope image mosaic from the Galaxy Evolution from Morphology and SEDs (GEMS) project in conjunction with the COMBO-17 deep photometric redshift survey to define a sample of nearly 1500 galaxies with 0.65 < z < 0.75. With this sample, we can study the distribution of rest-frame V-band morphologies more than 6 Gyr ago, without differential bandpass shifting and surface brightness dimming across this narrow redshift slice. Focusing on red-sequence galaxies at z ~ 0.7, we find that 85% of their combined rest-frame V-band luminosity density comes from visually-classified E/S0/Sa galaxies (at V-band magnitudes brighter than -19.5). Similar results are obtained if automated classifiers are used. This fraction is identical to that found at the present day, and is biased by less than 10% by large scale structure and the morphology-density relation. Under the assumption that peculiar and edge-on disk galaxies are red by virtue of their dust content, we find that less than 13% of the total rest-frame V-band luminosity of the z ~ 0.7 red galaxy population is from dusty galaxies.

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