arXiv subjects

Dylan Nelson

Publications and source records attributed to Dylan Nelson.

At least 145 records · Page 8Linked to original sources

arXiv2021

The IllustrisTNG Simulations: Public Data Release

We present the full public release of all data from the TNG50, TNG100 and TNG300 simulations of the IllustrisTNG project. IllustrisTNG is a suite of large volume, cosmological, gravo-magnetohydrodynamical simulations run with the moving-mesh code Arepo. TNG includes a comprehensive model for galaxy formation physics, and each TNG simulation self-consistently solves for the coupled evolution of dark matter, cosmic gas, luminous stars, and supermassive blackholes from early time to the present day, z=0. Each of the flagship runs -- TNG50, TNG100, and TNG300 -- are accompanied by lower-resolution and dark-matter only counterparts, and we discuss scientific and numerical cautions and caveats relevant when using TNG. Full volume snapshots are available at 100 redshifts; halo and subhalo catalogs at each snapshot and merger trees are also released. The data volume now directly accessible online is ~1.1 PB, including 2,000 full volume snapshots and ~110,000 high time-resolution subbox snapshots. Data access and analysis examples are available in IDL, Python, and Matlab. We describe improvements and new functionality in the web-based API, including on-demand visualization and analysis of galaxies and halos, exploratory plotting of scaling relations and other relationships between galactic and halo properties, and a new JupyterLab interface. This provides an online, browser-based, near-native data analysis platform which supports user computation with fully local access to TNG data, alleviating the need to download large simulated datasets.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2021

Spatially Resolved Star Formation and Inside-out Quenching in the TNG50 Simulation and 3D-HST Observations

We compare the star forming main sequence (SFMS) -- both integrated and resolved on 1kpc scales -- between the high-resolution TNG50 simulation of IllustrisTNG and observations from the 3D-HST slitless spectroscopic survey at z~1. Contrasting integrated star formation rates (SFRs), we find that the slope and normalization of the star-forming main sequence in TNG50 are quantitatively consistent with values derived by fitting observations from 3D-HST with the Prospector Bayesian inference framework. The previous offsets of 0.2-1dex between observed and simulated main sequence normalizations are resolved when using the updated masses and SFRs from Prospector. The scatter is generically smaller in TNG50 than in 3D-HST for more massive galaxies with M_*>10^10Msun, even after accounting for observational uncertainties. When comparing resolved star formation, we also find good agreement between TNG50 and 3D-HST: average specific star formation rate (sSFR) radial profiles of galaxies at all masses and radii below, on, and above the SFMS are similar in both normalization and shape. Most noteworthy, massive galaxies with M_*>10^10.5Msun, which have fallen below the SFMS due to ongoing quenching, exhibit a clear central SFR suppression, in both TNG50 and 3D-HST. In TNG this inside-out quenching is due to the supermassive black hole (SMBH) feedback model operating at low accretion rates. In contrast, the original Illustris simulation, without this same physical SMBH mechanism, does not reproduce the central SFR profile suppression seen in data. The observed sSFR profiles provide support for the TNG quenching mechanism and how it affects gas on kiloparsec scales in the centers of galaxies.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2021

The cumulative star-formation histories of dwarf galaxies with TNG50. I: Environment-driven diversity and connection to quenching

We present the cumulative star-formation histories (SFHs) of >15000 dwarf galaxies ($M_{*}=10^{7-10}M_{\odot}$) from the TNG50 run of the IllustrisTNG suite across a vast range of environments. The key factors determining the dwarfs' SFHs are their status as central or satellite and their stellar mass, with centrals and more massive dwarfs assembling their stellar mass at later times on average compared to satellites and lower mass dwarfs. The satellites (in hosts of total mass $M_{200c,\,host}=10^{12-14.3}M_{\odot}$) assembled 90% of their z=0 stellar mass ~$7.0_{-5.5}^{+3.3}$ Gyr ago, while the centrals did so only ~$1.0_{-0.5}^{+4.0}$ Gyr ago. TNG50 predicts a large diversity in SFHs for both centrals and satellites, so that the stacked cumulative SFHs are representative of the TNG50 dwarf populations only in an average sense and individual dwarfs can have significantly different cumulative SFHs. Satellite dwarfs with the highest stellar mass to host mass ratios have the latest stellar mass assembly. Satellites at fixed stellar and host halo mass, found closer to the cluster centre, or accreted at earlier times, show significantly earlier stellar mass assembly. These trends, as well as the shapes of the SFHs themselves, are a manifestation of the varying proportions within a given subsample of quenched vs. star-forming galaxies, which exhibit markedly distinct SFH shapes. We also find a subtle effect whereby satellite dwarfs in the most massive hosts at z=0 have higher SFRs at early times, well before final infall into their z=0 host, compared to a control sample of centrals mass-matched at the time of accretion. This suggests that the large-scale environment can have a mild effect even on future satellites by providing the conditions for enhanced SF at early epochs. Our results are useful theoretical predictions for comparison to future resolved-stellar-population observations.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2021

The dust-continuum size of TNG50 galaxies at $z=1-5$: a comparison with the distribution of stellar light, stars, dust and H$_2$

We present predictions for the extent of the dust-continuum emission of thousands of main-sequence galaxies drawn from the TNG50 simulation between $z=1-5$. To this aim, we couple the radiative transfer code SKIRT to the output of the TNG50 simulation and measure the dust-continuum half-light radius of the modeled galaxies, assuming a Milky Way dust type and a metallicity dependent dust-to-metal ratio. The dust-continuum half-light radius at observed-frame 850 $μ$m is up to $\sim$75 per cent larger than the stellar half-mass radius, but significantly more compact than the observed-frame 1.6 $μ$m (roughly corresponding to H-band) half-light radius, particularly towards high redshifts: the compactness compared to the 1.6 $μ$m emission increases with redshift. This is driven by obscuration of stellar light from the galaxy centres, which increases the apparent extent of 1.6 $μ$m disk sizes relative to that at 850 $μ$m. The difference in relative extents increases with redshift because the observed-frame 1.6 $μ$m emission stems from ever shorter wavelength stellar emission. These results suggest that the compact dust-continuum emission observed in $z>1$ galaxies is not (necessarily) evidence of the buildup of a dense central stellar component. We also find that the dust-continuum half-light radius very closely follows the radius containing half the star formation in galaxies, indicating that single band dust-continuum emission is a good tracer of the location of (obscured) star formation. The dust-continuum emission is more compact than the H2 mass (for galaxies at $z\geq 2$) and the underlying dust mass. The dust emission strongly correlates with locations with the highest dust temperatures, which do not need to be the locations where most H$_2$ and/or dust is located. The presented results are a common feature of main-sequence galaxies.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2021

Ultra-high energy cosmic rays deflection by the Intergalactic Magnetic Field

The origin and composition of ultra-high energy cosmic rays (UHECRs) remain a mystery. The common lore is that UHECRs are deflected from their primary directions by the Galactic and extragalactic magnetic fields. Here we describe an extragalactic contribution to the deflection of UHECRs that does not depend on the strength and orientation of the initial seed field. Using the IllustrisTNG simulations, we show that outflow-driven magnetic bubbles created by feedback processes during galaxy formation deflect approximately half of all $10^{20}$ eV protons by $1^{\circ}$ or more, and up to $20$-$30^{\circ}$. This implies that the deflection in the intergalactic medium must be taken into account in order to identify the sources of UHECRs.

astro-ph.HE↗

arXiv2020

Molecular hydrogen in IllustrisTNG galaxies: carefully comparing signatures of environment with local CO & SFR data

We examine how the post-processed content of molecular hydrogen (H$_2$) in galaxies from the TNG100 cosmological, hydrodynamic simulation changes with environment at $z\!=\!0$, assessing central/satellite status and host halo mass. We make close comparisons with the carbon monoxide (CO) emission survey xCOLD GASS where possible, having mock-observed TNG100 galaxies to match the survey's specifications. For a representative sample of host haloes across $10^{11}\!\lesssim\!M_{\rm 200c}/{\rm M}_{\odot}\!<\!10^{14.6}$, TNG100 predicts that satellites with $m_*\!\geq\!10^9\,{\rm M}_{\odot}$ should have a median deficit in their H$_2$ fractions of $\sim$0.6 dex relative to centrals of the same stellar mass. Once observational and group-finding uncertainties are accounted for, the signature of this deficit decreases to $\sim$0.2 dex. Remarkably, we calculate a deficit in xCOLD GASS satellites' H$_2$ content relative to centrals of 0.2--0.3 dex, in line with our prediction. We further show that TNG100 and SDSS data exhibit continuous declines in the average star formation rates of galaxies at fixed stellar mass in denser environments, in quantitative agreement with each other. By tracking satellites from their moment of infall in TNG100, we directly show that atomic hydrogen (HI) is depleted at fractionally higher rates than H$_2$ on average. Supporting this picture, we find that the H$_2$/HI mass ratios of satellites are elevated relative to centrals in xCOLD GASS. We provide additional predictions for the effect of environment on H$_2$ -- both absolute and relative to HI -- that can be tested with spectral stacking in future CO surveys.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2020

The relationship between fine galaxy stellar morphology and star formation activity in cosmological simulations: a deep learning view

Hydrodynamical simulations of galaxy formation and evolution attempt to fully model the physics that shapes galaxies. The agreement between the morphology of simulated and real galaxies, and the way the morphological types are distributed across galaxy scaling relations are important probes of our knowledge of galaxy formation physics. Here we propose an unsupervised deep learning approach to perform a stringent test of the fine morphological structure of galaxies coming from the Illustris and IllustrisTNG (TNG100 and TNG50) simulations against observations from a subsample of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. Our framework is based on PixelCNN, an autoregressive model for image generation with an explicit likelihood. We adopt a strategy that combines the output of two PixelCNN networks in a metric that isolates the fine morphological details of galaxies from the sky background. We are able to \emph{quantitatively} identify the improvements of IllustrisTNG, particularly in the high-resolution TNG50 run, over the original Illustris. However, we find that the fine details of galaxy structure are still different between observed and simulated galaxies. This difference is driven by small, more spheroidal, and quenched galaxies which are globally less accurate regardless of resolution and which have experienced little improvement between the three simulations explored. We speculate that this disagreement, that is less severe for quenched disky galaxies, may stem from a still too coarse numerical resolution, which struggles to properly capture the inner, dense regions of quenched spheroidal galaxies.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2020

Galaxy bias and primordial non-Gaussianity: insights from galaxy formation simulations with IllustrisTNG

We study the impact that large-scale perturbations of (i) the matter density and (ii) the primordial gravitational potential with local primordial non-Gaussianity (PNG) have on galaxy formation using the IllustrisTNG model. We focus on the linear galaxy bias $b_1$ and the coefficient $b_ϕ$ of the scale-dependent bias induced by PNG, which describe the response of galaxy number counts to these two types of perturbations, respectively. We perform our study using separate universe simulations, in which the effect of the perturbations is mimicked by changes to the cosmological parameters: modified cosmic matter density for $b_1$ and modified amplitude $\mathcal{A}_s$ of the primordial scalar power spectrum for $b_ϕ$. We find that the widely used universality relation $b_ϕ= 2δ_c(b_1 - 1)$ is a poor description of the bias of haloes and galaxies selected by stellar mass $M_*$, which is instead described better by $b_ϕ(M_*) = 2δ_c(b_1(M_*) - p)$ with $p \in [0.4, 0.7]$. This is explained by the different impact that matter overdensities and local PNG have on the median stellar-to-halo-mass relation. A simple model of this impact allows us to describe the stellar mass dependence of $b_1$ and $b_ϕ$ fairly well. Our results also show a nontrivial relation between $b_1$ and $b_ϕ$ for galaxies selected by color and black hole mass accretion rate. Our results provide refined priors on $b_ϕ$ for local PNG constraints and forecasts using galaxy clustering. Given that the widely used universality relation underpredicts $b_ϕ(M_*)$, existing analyses may underestimate the true constraining power on local PNG.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2020

Joint galaxy-galaxy lensing and clustering constraints on galaxy formation

We compare predictions for galaxy-galaxy lensing profiles and clustering from the Henriques et al. (2015) public version of the Munich semi-analytical model of galaxy formation (SAM) and the IllustrisTNG suite, primarily TNG300, with observations from KiDS+GAMA and SDSS-DR7 using four different selection functions for the lenses (stellar mass, stellar mass and group membership, stellar mass and isolation criteria, stellar mass and colour). We find that this version of the SAM does not agree well with the current data for stellar mass-only lenses with $M_\ast > 10^{11}\,M_\odot$. By decreasing the merger time for satellite galaxies as well as reducing the radio-mode AGN accretion efficiency in the SAM, we obtain better agreement, both for the lensing and the clustering, at the high mass end. We show that the new model is consistent with the signals for central galaxies presented in Velliscig et al. (2017). Turning to the hydrodynamical simulation, TNG300 produces good lensing predictions, both for stellar mass-only ($χ^2 = 1.81$ compared to $χ^2 = 7.79$ for the SAM), and locally brightest galaxies samples ($χ^2 = 3.80$ compared to $χ^2 = 5.01$). With added dust corrections to the colours it matches the SDSS clustering signal well for red low mass galaxies. We find that both the SAMs and TNG300 predict $\sim 50\,\%$ excessive lensing signals for intermediate mass red galaxies with $10.2 < \log_{10} M_\ast [ M_\odot ] < 11.2$ at $r \approx 0.6\,h^{-1}\,\mathrm{Mpc}$, which require further theoretical development.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2020

Evolution of the grain size distribution in Milky Way-like galaxies in post-processed IllustrisTNG simulations

We model dust evolution in Milky Way-like galaxies by post-processing the IllustrisTNG cosmological hydrodynamical simulations in order to predict dust-to-gas ratios and grain size distributions. We treat grain-size-dependent dust growth and destruction processes using a 64-bin discrete grain size evolution model without spatially resolving each galaxy. Our model broadly reproduces the observed dust--metallicity scaling relation in nearby galaxies. The grain size distribution is dominated by large grains at $z\gtrsim 3$ and the small-grain abundance rapidly increases by shattering and accretion (dust growth) at $z\lesssim 2$. The grain size distribution approaches the so-called MRN distribution at $z\sim 1$, but a suppression of large-grain abundances occurs at $z<1$. Based on the computed grain size distributions and grain compositions, we also calculate the evolution of the extinction curve for each Milky Way analogue. Extinction curves are initially flat at $z>2$, and become consistent with the Milky Way extinction curve at $z\lesssim 1$ at $1/λ< 6~\rm μm^{-1}$. However, typical extinction curves predicted by our model have a steeper slope at short wavelengths than is observed in the Milky Way. This is due to the low-redshift decline of gas-phase metallicity and the dense gas fraction in our TNG Milky Way analogues that suppresses the formation of large grains through coagulation.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2020

Galaxy formation with L-GALAXIES: Modelling the environmental dependency of galaxy evolution and comparing with observations

We present a variation of the recently updated Munich semi-analytical galaxy formation model, L-Galaxies, with a new gas stripping method. Extending earlier work, we directly measure the local environmental properties of galaxies to formulate a more accurate treatment of ram-pressure stripping for all galaxies. We fully re-calibrate the modified L-Galaxies model using a Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) method with the stellar mass function and quenched fraction of galaxies at $0\leq z\leq2$ as constraints. Due to this re-calibration, global galaxy population relations, including the stellar mass function, quenched fractions versus galaxy mass and HI mass function are all largely unchanged and remain consistent with observations. By comparing to data on galaxy properties in different environments from the SDSS and HSC surveys, we demonstrate that our modified model improves the agreement with the quenched fractions and star formation rates of galaxies as a function of environment, stellar mass, and redshift. Overall, in the vicinity of haloes with total mass $10^{12}$ to $10^{15}\rm M_{\odot}$ at $z=0$, our new model produces higher quenched fractions and stronger environmental dependencies, better recovering observed trends with halocentric distance up to several virial radii. By analysing the actual amount of gas stripped from galaxies in our model, we show that those in the vicinity of massive haloes lose a large fraction of their hot halo gas before they become satellites. We demonstrate that this affects galaxy quenching both within and beyond the halo boundary. This is likely to influence the correlations between galaxies up to tens of megaparsecs.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2020

The Kinematics and Dark Matter Fractions of TNG50 Galaxies at z=2 from an Observational Perspective

We contrast the gas kinematics and dark matter contents of $z=2$ star-forming galaxies (SFGs) from state-of-the-art cosmological simulations within the $Λ$CDM framework to observations. To this end, we create realistic mock observations of massive SFGs ($M_*>4\times10^{10} M_{\odot}$, SFR $>50~M_{\odot}$ yr$^{-1}$) from the TNG50 simulation of the IllustrisTNG suite, resembling near-infrared, adaptive-optics assisted integral-field observations from the ground. Using observational line fitting and modeling techniques, we analyse in detail the kinematics of seven TNG50 galaxies from five different projections per galaxy, and compare them to observations of twelve massive SFGs by Genzel et al. (2020). The simulated galaxies show clear signs of disc rotation but mostly exhibit more asymmetric rotation curves, partly due to large intrinsic radial and vertical velocity components. At identical inclination angle, their one-dimensional velocity profiles can vary along different lines of sight by up to $Δv=200$ km s$^{-1}$. From dynamical modelling we infer rotation speeds and velocity dispersions that are broadly consistent with observational results. We find low central dark matter fractions compatible with observations ($f_{\rm DM}^v(<R_e)=v_{\rm DM}^2(R_e)/v_{\rm circ}^2(R_e)\sim0.32\pm0.10$), however for disc effective radii $R_e$ that are mostly too small: at fixed $R_e$ the TNG50 dark matter fractions are too high by a factor of $\sim2$. We speculate that the differences in gas kinematics and dark matter content compared to the observations may be due to physical processes that are not resolved in sufficient detail with the numerical resolution available in current cosmological simulations.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2020

First results from SMAUG: Insights into star formation conditions from spatially-resolved ISM properties in TNG50

Physical and chemical properties of the interstellar medium (ISM) at sub-galactic ($\sim$kpc) scales play an indispensable role in controlling the ability of gas to form stars. As part of the SMAUG (Simulating Multiscale Astrophysics to Understand Galaxies) project, in this paper, we use the TNG50 cosmological simulation to explore the physical parameter space of 8 resolved ISM properties in star-forming regions to constrain the areas of this hyperspace over which most star-forming environments exist. We deconstruct our simulated galaxies spanning a wide range of mass (M$_\star = 10^{7-11}$ M$_\odot$) and redshift ($0 \leq z \leq 3$) into kpc-sized regions, and statistically analyze the gas/stellar surface densities, gas metallicity, vertical stellar velocity dispersion, epicyclic frequency and dark-matter volumetric density representative of each region in the context of their star formation activity and galactic environment (radial galactocentric location). By examining the star formation rate (SFR) weighted distributions of these properties, we show that stars primarily form in two spatially distinct environmental regimes, which are brought about by an underlying bi-component radial SFR surface density profile in galaxies. We examine how the relative prominence of these two regimes depends on host galaxy mass and cosmic time. We also compare our findings with those from integral field spectroscopy observations and achieve a good overall agreement. Further, using dimensionality reduction, we characterise the aforementioned hyperspace to reveal a high-degree of multicollinearity in relationships amongst ISM properties that drive the distribution of star formation at kpc-scales. Based on this, we show that a reduced 3D representation underpinned by a multi-variate radius relationship is sufficient to capture most of the variance in the original 8D space.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2020

Quenched fractions in the IllustrisTNG simulations: the roles of AGN feedback, environment, and pre-processing

We use the IllustrisTNG simulations to show how the fractions of quenched galaxies vary across different environments and cosmic time, and to quantify the role AGN feedback and preprocessing play in quenching group and cluster satellites. At $z=0$, we select galaxies with $M_* = 10^{9-12} M_{\odot}$ residing within ($\leq R_{200c}$) groups and clusters of total host mass $M_{200c}=10^{13-15.2} M_{\odot}$. TNG predicts a quenched fraction of $\sim70-90\%$ (on average) for centrals and satellites $\gtrsim 10^{10.5} M_{\odot}$, regardless of host mass, cosmic time ($0\leq z\leq0.5$), clustercentric distance and time since infall in the $z=0$ host. Low-mass centrals ($\lesssim 10^{10} M_{\odot}$), instead, are rarely quenched unless they become members of groups ($10^{13-14} M_{\odot}$) or clusters ($\geq10^{14} M_{\odot}$), where the quenched fraction rises to $\sim80\%$. The fraction of low-mass passive galaxies is higher closer to the host center and for more massive hosts. The population of low-mass satellites accreted $\gtrsim$4-6 Gyr ago in massive hosts is almost entirely passive, thus suggesting an upper limit for the time needed for environmental quenching to occur. In fact, $\sim30\%$ of group and cluster satellites that are quenched at $z=0$ were already quenched before falling into their current host, and the bulk of them quenched as early as 4 to 10 billion years ago. For low-mass galaxies ($\lesssim10^{10-10.5}M_{\odot}$), this is due to preprocessing, whereby current satellites may have been members of other hosts, and hence have undergone environmental processes, before falling into their final host, this mechanism being more common and more effective for the purposes of quenching for satellites found today in more massive hosts. On the other hand, massive galaxies quench on their own and because of AGN feedback, regardless of whether they are centrals or satellites.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2020

Coordinated Assembly of Galaxy Groups and Clusters in the IllustrisTNG Simulations

Recent stellar population analysis of early-type galaxy spectra has demonstrated that the low-mass galaxies in cluster centers have high [$α/\rm Fe$] and old ages characteristic of massive galaxies and unlike the low-mass galaxy population in the outskirts of clusters and fields. This phenomenon has been termed "coordinated assembly" to highlight the fact that the building blocks of massive cluster central galaxies are drawn from a special subset of the overall low-mass galaxy population. Here we explore this idea in the IllustrisTNG simulations, particularly the TNG300 run, in order to understand how environment, especially cluster centers, shape the star formation histories of quiescent satellite galaxies in groups and clusters ($M_{200c,z=0}\geq10^{13} M_{\odot}$). Tracing histories of quenched satellite galaxies with $M_{\star,z=0}\geq10^{10} M_{\odot}$, we find that those in more massive dark matter halos, and located closer to the primary galaxies, are quenched earlier, have shorter star formation timescales, and older stellar ages. The star formation timescale-$M_{\star}$ and stellar age-$M_{\star}$ scaling relations are in good agreement with observations, and are predicted to vary with halo mass and cluster-centric distance. The dependence on environment arises due to the infall histories of satellite galaxies: galaxies that are located closer to cluster centers in more massive dark matter halos at $z=0$ were accreted earlier on average. The delay between infall and quenching time is shorter for galaxies in more massive halos, and depends on the halo mass at its first accretion, showing that group pre-processing is a crucial aspect in satellite quenching.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2020

Predictions for the Angular Dependence of Gas Mass Flow Rate and Metallicity in the Circumgalactic Medium

We use cosmological hydrodynamical simulations to examine the physical properties of the gas in the circumgalactic media (CGM) of star-forming galaxies as a function of angular orientation. We utilise TNG50 of the IllustrisTNG project, as well as the EAGLE simulation to show that observable properties of CGM gas correlate with azimuthal angle, defined as the galiocentric angle with respect to the central galaxy. Both simulations are in remarkable agreement in predicting a strong modulation of flow rate direction with azimuthal angle: inflow is more substantial along the galaxy major axis, while outflow is strongest along the minor axis. The absolute rates are noticeably larger for higher (log(M_* / M_sun) ~ 10.5) stellar mass galaxies, up to an order of magnitude compared to M^dot < 1 M_sun/yr/sr for log(M_* / M_sun) ~ 9.5 objects. Notwithstanding the different numerical and physical models, both TNG50 and EAGLE predict that the average metallicity of the CGM is higher along the minor versus major axes of galaxies. The angular signal is robust across a wide range of galaxy stellar mass 8.5 < log(M_* / M_sun) < 10.5 at z<1. This azimuthal dependence is particularly clear at larger impact parameters b > 100 kpc. Our results present a global picture whereby, despite the numerous mixing processes, there is a clear angular dependence of the CGM metallicity. We make forecasts for future large survey programs that will be able to compare against these expectations. Indeed, characterising the kinematics, spatial distribution and metal content of CGM gas is key to a full understanding of the exchange of mass, metals, and energy between galaxies and their surrounding environments.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2020

A redshift-dependent IRX-$β$ dust attenuation relation for TNG50 galaxies

We study the relation between the UV-slope, $β$, and the ratio between the infrared- and UV-luminosities (IRX) of galaxies from TNG50, the latest installment of the IllustrisTNG galaxy formation simulations. We select 7280 star-forming main-sequence (SFMS) galaxies with stellar mass $10^9M_\odot$ at redshifts $0 \leq z \leq 4$ and perform radiative transfer with SKIRT to model effects of interstellar medium dust on the emitted stellar light. Assuming a Milky Way (MW) dust type and a dust-to-metal ratio of 0.3, we find that TNG50 SFMS galaxies generally agree with observationally-derived IRX-$β$ relations at $z \lesssim 1$. However, we find a redshift-dependent systematic offset with respect to empirically-derived local relations, with the TNG50 IRX-$β$ relation shifting towards lower $β$ and steppening at higher redshifts. This is partially driven by variations in the dust-uncorrected UV-slope of galaxies, due to different star-formation histories of galaxies selected at different cosmic epochs; we suggest the remainder of the effect is caused by differences in the effective dust attenuation curves (EDACs) of galaxies as a function of redshift. We find a typical galaxy-to-galaxy variation of 0.3 dex in IRX at fixed $β$, correlated with intrinsic galaxy properties: galaxies with higher star-formation rates, star-formation efficiencies, gas metallicities and stellar masses exhibit larger IRX values. We demonstrate a degeneracy between stellar age, dust geometry and dust composition: $z=4$ galaxies with a Small Magellanic Cloud dust type follow the same IRX-$β$ relation as low-redshift galaxies with MW dust. We provide a redshift-dependent fitting function for the IRX-$β$ relation for MW dust based on our models.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2020

Ejective and preventative: the IllustrisTNG black hole feedback and its effects on the thermodynamics of the gas within and around galaxies

Supermassive black holes (SMBHs) which reside at the centres of galaxies can inject vast amounts of energy into the surrounding gas and are thought to be a viable mechanism to quench star-formation in massive galaxies. Here we study the $10^{9\textrm{--}12.5}\,\mathrm{M_\odot}$ stellar mass central galaxy population of the IllustrisTNG simulation, specifically the TNG100 and TNG300 volumes at \zeq{0}, and show how the three components -- SMBH, galaxy, and circumgalactic medium (CGM) -- are interconnected in their evolution. We find that gas entropy is a sensitive diagnostic of feedback injection. In particular, we demonstrate how the onset of the low-accretion BH feedback mode, realised in the IllustrisTNG model as a kinetic, BH-driven wind, leads not only to star-formation quenching at stellar masses $\gtrsim10^{10.5}\mathrm{M_\odot}$ but also to a change in thermodynamic properties of the (\emph{non}-star-forming) gas, both within the galaxy and beyond. The IllustrisTNG kinetic feedback from SMBHs increases the average gas entropy, within the galaxy and in the CGM, lengthening typical gas cooling times from $10\textrm{--}100\,\mathrm{Myr}$ to $1\textrm{--}10\,\mathrm{Gyr}$, effectively ceasing ongoing star-formation and inhibiting radiative cooling and future gas accretion. In practice, the same AGN feedback channel is simultaneously `ejective' and `preventative' and leaves an imprint on the temperature, density, entropy, and cooling times also in the outer reaches of the gas halo, up to distances of several hundred kiloparsecs. In the IllustrisTNG model, a long-lasting quenching state can occur for a heterogeneous CGM, whereby the hot and dilute CGM gas of quiescent galaxies contains regions of low-entropy gas with short cooling times.

astro-ph.GA↗