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E. Hardy

Publications and source records attributed to E. Hardy.

14 recordsLinked to original sources
arXiv2025

QSHS: An Axion Dark Matter Resonant Search Apparatus

We describe a resonant cavity search apparatus for axion dark matter constructed by the Quantum Sensors for the Hidden Sector (QSHS) collaboration. The apparatus is configured to search for QCD axion dark matter, though also has the capability to detect axion-like particles (ALPs), dark photons, and some other forms of wave-like dark matter. Initially, a tuneable cylindrical oxygen-free copper cavity is read out using a low noise microwave amplifier feeding a heterodyne receiver. The cavity is housed in a dilution refrigerator and threaded by a solenoidal magnetic field, nominally 8T. The apparatus also houses a magnetic field shield for housing superconducting electronics, and several other fixed-frequency resonators for use in testing and commissioning various prototype quantum electronic devices sensitive at a range of axion masses in the range 2.0 to 40 micro-eV/c2. The apparatus as currently configured is intended as a test stand for electronics over the relatively wide frequency band attainable with the TM010 cavity mode used for axion searches. We present performance data for the resonator, dilution refrigerator, and magnet, and plans for the first science run.

physics.ins-det↗
arXiv2015

Recovering star formation histories: Integrated-light analyses vs stellar colour-magnitude diagrams

Accurate star formation histories (SFHs) of galaxies are fundamental for understanding the build-up of their stellar content. However, the most accurate SFHs - those obtained from colour-magnitude diagrams (CMDs) of resolved stars reaching the oldest main sequence turnoffs (oMSTO) - are presently limited to a few systems in the Local Group. It is therefore crucial to determine the reliability and range of applicability of SFHs derived from integrated light spectroscopy, as this affects our understanding of unresolved galaxies from low to high redshift. To evaluate the reliability of current full spectral fitting techniques in deriving SFHs from integrated light spectroscopy by comparing SFHs from integrated spectra to those obtained from deep CMDs of resolved stars. We have obtained a high signal--to--noise (S/N $\sim$ 36.3 per Å) integrated spectrum of a field in the bar of the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) using EFOSC2 at the 3.6 meter telescope at La Silla Observatory. For this same field, resolved stellar data reaching the oMSTO are available. We have compared the star formation rate (SFR) as a function of time and the age-metallicity relation (AMR) obtained from the integrated spectrum using {\tt STECKMAP}, and the CMD using the IAC-star/MinnIAC/IAC-pop set of routines. For the sake of completeness we also use and discuss other synthesis codes ({\tt STARLIGHT} and {\tt ULySS}) to derive the SFR and AMR from the integrated LMC spectrum. We find very good agreement (average differences $\sim$ 4.1 $\%$) between the SFR(t) and the AMR obtained using {\tt STECKMAP} on the integrated light spectrum, and the CMD analysis. {\tt STECKMAP} minimizes the impact of the age-metallicity degeneracy and has the advantage of preferring smooth solutions to recover complex SFHs by means of a penalized $χ^2$. [abridged]

astro-ph.GA↗
arXiv2014

Integral-Field Stellar and Ionized Gas Kinematics of Peculiar Virgo Cluster Spiral Galaxies

We present the stellar and ionized gas kinematics of 13 bright peculiar Virgo cluster galaxies observed with the DensePak Integral Field Unit at the WIYN 3.5-meter telescope, to seek kinematic evidence that these galaxies have experienced gravitational interactions or gas stripping. 2-Dimensional maps of the stellar velocity $V$, and stellar velocity dispersion $σ$ and the ionized gas velocity (H$β$ and/or [\ion{O}{3}]) are presented for galaxies in the sample. The stellar rotation curves and velocity dispersion profiles are determined for 13 galaxies, and the ionized gas rotation curves are determined for 6 galaxies. Misalignments between the optical and kinematical major axis are found in several galaxies. While in some cases this is due to a bar, in other cases it seems associated with a gravitational interaction or ongoing ram pressure stripping. Non-circular gas motions are found in nine galaxies, with various causes including bars, nuclear outflows, or gravitational disturbances. Several galaxies have signatures of kinematically distinct stellar components, which are likely signatures of accretion or mergers. We compute for all galaxies the angular momentum parameter $λ_{\rm R}$. An evaluation of the galaxies in the $λ_{\rm R}$-ellipticity plane shows that all but 2 of the galaxies have significant support from random stellar motions, and have likely experienced gravitational interactions. This includes some galaxies with very small bulges and truncated/compact H$α$ morphologies, indicating that such galaxies cannot be fully explained by simple ram pressure stripping, but must have had significant gravitational encounters. Most of the sample galaxies show evidence for ICM-ISM stripping as well as gravitational interactions, indicating that the evolution of a significant fraction of cluster galaxies is likely strongly impacted by both effects.

astro-ph.GA↗
arXiv2011

Metallicities, Age--Metallicity relationships, and Kinematics of Red Giant Branch Stars in the Outer Disk of the Large Magellanic Cloud

The outer disk of the LMC is studied in order to unveil clues about its formation and evolution. Complementing our previous studies in innermost fields (3<R<7 kpc), we obtained deep color magnitude diagrams in 6 fields with radius from 5.2 to 9.2 kpc. The comparison with isochrones shows that while the oldest population is approximately coeval in all fields, the age of the youngest populations increases with increasing radius. Low-resolution spectroscopy in the infrared CaII triplet region has been obtained for about 150 stars near the tip red giant branch in the same fields. Radial velocities and stellar metallicities have been obtained from these spectra. The metallicity distribution of each field has been analyzed together with those previously studied. The metal content of the most metal-poor objects, which are also the oldest according to the derived age-metallicity relationships, is similar in all fields independently of the radius. However, while the metallicity of the most metal-rich objects measured, which are the youngest ones, remains constant in the inner 6 kpc, it decreases with increasing radius from there off. The same is true for the mean metallicity. According to the derived age-metallicity relationships, which are consistent with being the same in all fields, this result may be interpreted as an outside-in formation scheme in opposition with the inside-out scenario predicted by LCDM cosmology for a galaxy like the LMC. The analysis of the radial velocities of our sample of giants shows that they follow a rotational cold disk kinematics. The velocity dispersion increases as metallicity decreases indicating that the most metal-poor/oldest objects are distributed in a thicker disk than the most metal-rich/youngest ones in agreement with the findings in other disks such as that of the Milky Way. They do not seem to be part of a hot halo, if one exists in the LMC.

astro-ph.CO↗
arXiv2010

G30.79~FIR~10: A gravitationally bound infalling high-Mass star forming clump

Infalling motions were detected and modeled toward this source. A mean infall velocity of 0.5 km/s with an infall mass rate of 5x10^-3 Solar masses per year was obtained. Also, a previously estimated value for the magnetic field strength in the plane of the sky was refined to be 855 micro Gauss which we used to calculate a mass-to-magnetic flux ratio of 1.9, or super-critical. The virial mass from turbulent motions was also calculated finding Mvir=563 solar masses, which gives a ratio of Msubmm/Mvir=5.9. Both values strongly suggest that this clump must be in a state of gravitational collapse.

astro-ph.GA↗
arXiv2008

Outside-in disk evolution in the LMC

From the analysis of the color-magnitude diagrams and color functions of four wide LMC fields located from ~2 to 6 kpc from the kinematic center of the LMC we present evidence that, while the oldest population is coeval in all fields, the age of the youngest component of the dominant stellar population gradually increases with galactocentric distance, from currently active star formation in a field at 2.3 deg, to 100 Myr, 0.8 Gyr, and 1.5 Gyr in fields at 4.0 deg, 5.5 deg, and 7.1 deg, respectively. This outside-in quenching of the star formation in the LMC disk is correlated with the decreasing HI column density (which is < 2x 10^{20} cm^{-2} in the two outermost fields with little or no current star formation. Other work in the literature hints at similar behavior in the stellar populations of irregular galaxies, and in M33. This is observational evidence against the inside-out disk formation scenario in low-mass spirals and irregular galaxies. Alternatively, it could be that the age distribution with radius results from interplay between the evolution with time of the star-forming area of the LMC and the subsequent outward migration of the stars.

astro-ph↗
arXiv2006

Characterizing stellar populations in spiral disks

It is now possible to measure detailed spectral indices for stellar populations in spiral disks. We propose to interpret these data using evolutionary synthesis models computed from the Star Formation Histories obtained from chemical evolutionary models. We find that this technique is a powerful tool to discriminate between old and young stellar populations. We show an example of the power of Integral Field spectroscopy in unveiling the spatial distribution of populations in a barred galaxy.

astro-ph↗
arXiv2006

The Nature of the Peculiar Virgo Cluster Galaxies NGC 4064 and NGC 4424

We present a detailed study of the peculiar HI-deficient Virgo cluster spiral galaxies NGC 4064 and NGC 4424, using $^{12}$CO 1-0 interferometry, optical imaging and integral-field spectroscopic observations, in order to learn what type of environmental interactions have afected these galaxies. Optical imaging reveals that NGC 4424 has a strongly disturbed stellar disk, with banana-shaped isophotes and shells. NGC 4064, which lies in the cluster outskirts, possesses a relatively undisturbed outer stellar disk and a central bar. In both galaxies H-alpha emission is confined to the central kiloparsec. CO observations reveal bilobal molecular gas morphologies, with H-alpha emission peaking inside the CO lobes, implying a time sequence in the star formation process.Gas kinematics reveals strong bar-like non-circular motions in the molecular gas in both galaxies, suggesting that the material is radially infalling. In NGC 4064 the stellar kinematics reveal strong bar-like non-circular motions in the central 1 kpc. On the other hand, NGC 4424 has extremely modest stellar rotation velocities (Vmax ~ 30 km s-1), and stars are supported by random motions as far out as we can measure it. The observations suggest that the peculiarities of NGC 4424 are the result of an intermediate-mass merger plus ram pressure stripping. In the case of NGC 4064, the evidence suggests an already stripped "truncated/normal" galaxy that recently suffered a minor merger or tidal interaction with another galaxy. We propose that galaxies with "truncated/compact" H-alpha morphologies such as these are the result of the independent effects of ram pressure stripping, which removes gas from the outer disk, and gravitational interactions such as mergers, which heat stellar disks, drive gas to the central kpc and increase the central mass concentrations.

astro-ph↗
arXiv2004

Surface Brightness and Stellar Populations at the Outer Edge of the Large Magellanic Cloud: No Stellar Halo Yet

We present a high quality CMD for a 36'x 36' field located 8 degrees (7 kpc) from the LMC center, as well as a precise determination of the LMC surface brightness derived from the resolved stellar population out to this large galactocentric radius. This deep CMD shows for the first time the detailed age distribution at this position, where the surface brightness is V=26.5 mag/sq". At a radius R=474' the main sequence is well populated from the oldest turnoff at I=21.5 to the 2.5 Gyr turnoff at I=19.5. Beyond this radius, a relatively strong gradient in the density of stars with ages in the 2.5-4 Gyr range is apparent. There are some stars brighter and bluer than the main population, quite uniformly distributed over the whole area surveyed, which are well matched by a 1.5 Gyr isochrone and may be indicative of a relatively recent star formation, or merger, event. The surface brightness profile of the LMC remains exponential to this large galactocentric radius and shows no evidence of disk truncation. Combining the information on surface brightness and stellar population we conclude that the LMC disk extends (and dominates over a possible stellar halo) out to a distance of at least 7 kpc. These results confirm that the absence of blue stars in the relatively shallow off-center CMDs of dIrr galaxies is not necessarily evidence for an exclusively old stellar population resembling the halo of the Milky Way.

astro-ph↗
arXiv2003

How to determine the star formation histories in spiral disks

We have computed 500 chemical evolution models for the galaxy NGC 4303. With the obtained evolutionary histories and a synthesis model we have also calculated the spectral indices Mg2 and Fe5270. Fom the 500 models, by using a chi-square technique, we obtain those reproducing the present day observations within a confidence level of 95 %, reducing the number of possible models to 19. Only 6 of them are also able to reproduce the spectral indices radial distributions with the same level of confidence. We conclude that this technique of combining chemical with evolutionary synthesis models is a very powerful tool, and, therefore, we propose to perform more observational campaigns to obtain these and other spectral indices in spiral and irregular galaxies.

astro-ph↗
arXiv2002

Constraining the evolutionary histories of spiral disks

We study the old problem of the uniqueness of chemical evolution models. We showed in Molla et al. (1999) that multiphase models for three Virgo cluster galaxies were able to reproduce the observed radial distributions of spectral indices Mg2 and Fe52. But those models may fit the present-epoch radial distributions with different star formation histories. The two spectral indices are in turn affected by the well known age-metallicity degeneracy which prevents the disentagling of age and metallicity for single stellar populations. In this work we face both issues by analyzing a set of multiphase models for the Virgo galaxy NGC 4303

astro-ph↗
arXiv1998

The stellar populations of spiral disks.II Measuring and modeling the radial distribution of absorption spectral indices

The radial distributions of the Mg2 and Fe5270 Lick spectral indices have been measured to large radial distances on the disks of NGC 4303 and NGC 4535 using an imaging technique based on interference filters. These data, added to those of NGC 4321 previously published in Paper I of this series are used to constraint chemical (multiphase) evolutionary models for these galaxies. Because the integrated light of a stellar disk is a time average over the history of the galaxy weighted by the star formation rate, these constraints complement the information on chemical gradients provided by the study of HII regions which, by themselves, can only provide the alpha-elements abundance accumulate over the life of the galaxy. The agreement between the observations and the model predictions shown here lends confidence to the models which are then used to describe the time evolution of galaxy parameters such as star formation rates, chemical gradients, and gradients in the mean age of the stellar population.

astro-ph↗
arXiv1997

The Stellar Populations of Spiral Disks. I. A New Observational

We describe an imaging method that makes use of interference filters to provide integrated stellar spectral indices for spiral disks to faint surface brightness limits. We use filters with bandpasses ~60A FWHM, centered on the Mg and Fe features (5176A and 5270A respectively) allowing the determination of the spatial distribution of the Lick indices Mg2 and Fe5270. These two indices have been extensively modeled by different groups and used in the past mainly for the study of elliptical galaxies, bulges, and globular clusters. Azimuthal integration of the underlying smooth stellar signal, after removal of the signature of the spiral arms and associated extreme pop. I structures, provides measurements of these spectral indices useful to radial distances where the surface brightness of the galaxy reaches ~24uV. As a first example of this technique and its possibilities we conduct a preliminary study of the SABbc galaxy NGC 4321 (M 100). We present spectral gradients for the inter-arm stellar population to about 4 exponential scale lengths. There is some evidence for a discontinuity in the run of the Mg2 index near corotation, which we interpret as evidence for bar- driven secular evolution. There is also evidence that Mg is overabundant with respect to Fe in the inner regions of the projected image.

astro-ph↗