The Zurich Environmental Study (ZENS) of Galaxies in Groups along the Cosmic Web. I. Which Environment Affects Galaxy Evolution?
The Zurich Environmental Study (ZENS) is based on a sample of ~1500 galaxy members of 141 groups in the mass range ~10^12.5-14.5 M_sun within the narrow redshift range 0.05 10^10 M_sun, satellite galaxies in relaxed and unrelaxed groups have similar size, color and (specific) star formation rate distributions; at lower galaxy masses, satellites are marginally redder in relaxed relative to unrelaxed groups, suggesting quenching of star formation in low-mass satellites by physical processes active in relaxed halos. Finally, relaxed and unrelated groups show similar stellar mass conversion efficiencies, peaking at halo masses around 10^12.5 M_sun. In the enclosed ZENS catalogue we publish all environmental diagnostics as well as the galaxy structural and photometric measurements described in companion ZENS papers II and III.