arXiv subjects

Jayaram N. Chengalur

Publications and source records attributed to Jayaram N. Chengalur.

At least 73 records · Page 4Linked to original sources

arXiv2010

HI 21 cm opacity fluctuations power spectra towards Cassiopeia A

The angular power spectrum of HI 21 cm opacity fluctuations is a useful statistic for quantifying the observed opacity fluctuations as well as for comparing these with theoretical models. We present here the HI 21 cm opacity fluctuation power spectrum towards the supernova remnant Cas A from interferometric data with spacial resolution of 5" and spectral resolution of 0.4 km/s. The power spectrum has been estimated using a simple but robust visibility based technique. We find that the power spectrum is well fit by a power law P_tau(U) = U^{alpha} with a power law index of alpha ~ -2.86 +/- 0.10 (3 sigma error) over the scales of 0.07 - 2.3 pc for the gas in the Perseus spiral arm and 0.002 - 0.07 pc (480 - 15730 au) for that in the Local arm. This estimated power law index is consistent with earlier observational results based on both HI emission over larger scales and absorption studies over a similar range of scales. We do not detect any statistically significant change in the power law index with the velocity width of the frequency channels. This constrains the power law index of the velocity structure function to be beta = 0.2 +/- 0.6 (3 sigma error).

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arXiv2010

Probing fundamental constant evolution with redshifted conjugate-satellite OH lines

We report Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope and Arecibo Telescope observations of the redshifted satellite OH-18cm lines at $z \sim 0.247$ towards PKS1413+135. The "conjugate" nature of these lines, with one line in emission and the other in absorption, but with the same shape, implies that the lines arise in the same gas. The satellite OH-18cm line frequencies also have different dependences on the fine structure constant $α$, the proton-electron mass ratio $μ= m_p/m_e$, and the proton gyromagnetic ratio $g_p$. Comparisons between the satellite line redshifts in conjugate systems can hence be used to probe changes in $α$, $μ$, and $g_p$, with few systematic effects. The technique yields the expected null result when applied to Cen.A, a nearby conjugate satellite system. For the $z \sim 0.247$ system towards PKS1413+135, we find, on combining results from the two telescopes, that $[ΔG/G] = (-1.18 \pm 0.46) \times 10^{-5}$ (weighted mean), where $G = g_p [μα^2]^{1.85}$; this is tentative evidence (with $2.6 σ$ significance, or at 99.1% confidence) for a smaller value of $α$, $μ$, and/or $g_p$ at z~0.247, i.e. at a lookback time of ~2.9 Gyrs. If we assume that the dominant change is in $α$, this implies $[Δα/α] = (-3.1 \pm 1.2) \times 10^{-6}$. We find no evidence that the observed offset might be produced by systematic effects, either due to observational or analysis procedures, or local conditions in the molecular cloud.

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arXiv2010

Thick gas discs in faint dwarf galaxies

We determine the intrinsic axial ratio distribution of the 'gas' disks of extremely faint M_B > -14.5 dwarf irregular galaxies. We start with the measured (beam corrected) distribution of apparent axial ratios in the HI 21cm images of dwarf irregular galaxies observed as part of the Faint Irregular Galaxy GMRT Survey (FIGGS). Assuming that the disks can be approximated as oblate spheroids, the intrinsic axial ratio distribution can be obtained from the observed apparent axial ratio distribution. We use a couple of methods to do this, and our final results are based on using Lucy's deconvolution algorithm. This method is constrained to produce physically plausible distributions, and also has the added advantage of allowing for observational errors to be accounted for. While one might a priori expect that gas disks would be thin (because collisions between gas clouds would cause them to quickly settle down to a thin disk), we find that the HI disks of faint dwarf irregulars are quite thick, with mean axial ratio ~ 0.6. While this is substantially larger than the typical value of ~ 0.2 for the 'stellar' disks of large spiral galaxies, it is consistent with the much larger ratio of velocity dispersion to rotational velocity (sigma/v_c) in dwarf galaxy HI disks as compared to that in spiral galaxies. Our findings have implications for studies of the mass distribution in and the Tully - Fisher relation for faint dwarf irregular galaxies, where it is often assumed that the gas is in a thin disk.

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arXiv2010

Turbulence in the Harassed Galaxy NGC 4254

Galaxy harassment is an important mechanism for the morphological evolution of galaxies in clusters. The spiral galaxy NGC 4254 in the Virgo cluster is believed to be a harassed galaxy. We have analyzed the power spectrum of HI emission fluctuations from NGC 4254 to investigate whether it carries any imprint of galaxy harassment. The power spectrum, as determined using the 16 central channels which contain most of the HI emission, is found to be well fitted by a power law $P(U)=AU^α$ with $α =-\ 1.7\pm 0.2$ at length-scales $1.7 \, {\rm k pc}$ to $ 8.4 \, {\rm kpc}$. This is similar to other normal spiral galaxies which have a slope of $\sim -1.5$ and is interpreted as arising from two dimensional turbulence at length-scales larger than the galaxy's scale-height. NGC 4254 is hence yet another example of a spiral galaxy that exhibits scale-invariant density fluctuations out to length-scales comparable to the diameter of the HI disk. While a large variety of possible energy sources like proto-stellar winds, supernovae, shocks, etc. have been proposed to produce turbulence, it is still to be seen whether these are effective on length-scales comparable to that of the entire HI disk. On separately analyzing the HI power spectrum in different parts of NGC 4254, we find that the outer parts have a different slope ($ α= -2.0\pm0.3$) compared to the central part of the galaxy ($α= -1.5\pm0.2$). Such a change in slope is not seen in other, undisturbed galaxies. We suggest that, in addition to changing the overall morphology, galaxy harassment also effects the fine scale structure of the ISM, causing the power spectrum to have a steeper slope in the outer parts.

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arXiv2010

When are extremely metal-deficient galaxies extremely metal-deficient?

Extremely metal-deficient (XMD) galaxies, by definition, have oxygen abundances \le 1/10 solar, and form a very small fraction of the local gas-rich, star-forming dwarf galaxy population. We examine their positions in the luminousity-metallicity (L-Z) and mass-metallicity (M-Z) planes, with respect to the L-Z and M-Z relations of other gas-rich, star-forming dwarf galaxies, viz., blue compact galaxies (BCGs) and dwarf irregular (dI) galaxies. We find that while the metallicities of some low-luminousity XMD galaxies are consistent with those expected from the L-Z relation, other XMD galaxies are deviant. We determine the 95 per cent confidence interval around the L-Z relation for BCGs, and find that its lower boundary is given by 12 + log(O/H) = -0.177 M_{B} + 4.87. We suggest that a galaxy should be regarded as XMD, in a statistically significant manner, only if it lies below this boundary in the L-Z plane. Of our sample of XMD galaxies, we find that more than half are XMD by this criterion. We also determine the gas mass fractions and chemical yields of galaxies in all three samples. We find that the effective chemical yield increases with increasing baryonic mass, consistent with what is expected if outflows of metal-enriched gas are important in determining the effective yield. XMD galaxies have lower effective yield than BCG/dI galaxies of similar baryonic mass. Motivated by the fact that interactions are common in XMD galaxies, we suggest that improved (tidally-driven) mixing of the interstellar media (ISM) in XMD galaxies leads to a lowering of both, the measured metallicity and the calculated effective yield. We suggest that XMD galaxies are deviant from the L-Z relation because of a combination of being gas-rich (i.e., having processed less gas into stars) and having more uniform mixing of metals in their ISM.

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arXiv2009

A metallicity-spin temperature relation in damped Lyman-$α$ systems

We report evidence for an anti-correlation between spin temperature $T_s$ and metallicity [Z/H], detected at $3.6 σ$ significance in a sample of 26 damped Lyman-$α$ absorbers (DLAs) at redshifts $0.09 < z < 3.45$. The anti-correlation is detected at $3 σ$ significance in a sub-sample of 20 DLAs with measured covering factors, implying that it does not stem from low covering factors. We obtain $T_s = (-0.68 \pm 0.17) \times {\rm [Z/H]} + (2.13 \pm 0.21)$ from a linear regression analysis. Our results indicate that the high $T_s$ values found in DLAs do not arise from differences between the optical and radio sightlines, but are likely to reflect the underlying gas temperature distribution. The trend between $T_s$ and [Z/H] can be explained by the larger number of radiation pathways for gas cooling in galaxies with high metal abundances, resulting in a high cold gas fraction, and hence, a low spin temperature. Conversely, low-metallicity galaxies have fewer cooling routes, yielding a larger warm gas fraction and a high $T_s$. Most DLAs at $z>1.7$ have low metallicities, [Z/H] $< -1$, implying that the HI in high-$z$ DLAs is predominantly warm. The anti-correlation between $T_s$ and [Z/H] is consistent with the presence of a mass-metallicity relation in DLAs, suggested by the tight correlation between DLA metallicity and the kinematic widths of metal lines. Most high-$z$ DLAs are likely to arise in galaxies with low masses ($M_{\rm vir} < 10^{10.5} M_\odot$), low metallicities ([Z/H]$< -1$, and low cold gas fractions.

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arXiv2009

Magnetohydrodynamic turbulence in supernova remnants

We present estimates of the angular power spectra of the synchrotron radiation intensity fluctuations at 6 and 20 cm for the shell type supernova remnant Cas A and the filled-centre Crab supernova remnant. We find that the intensity fluctuations of both sources have a power law power spectrum with index -3.24 +/- 0.03. This power law power spectrum is consistent with the magnetohydrodynamic turbulence in the synchrotron emitting plasma. For Cas A, there is a break in the power spectrum and the power law index changes from -3.2 to -2.2 at large angular scale. This transition occurs at an angular scale that corresponds to the shell thickness of Cas A. We interpret this as a transition from three dimensional turbulence to two dimensional turbulence on scales that are respectively smaller and larger than the shell thickness.

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arXiv2009

The HI gas content of galaxies around Abell 370, a galaxy cluster at z = 0.37

We used observations from the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope to measure the atomic hydrogen gas content of 324 galaxies around the galaxy cluster Abell 370 at a redshift of z = 0.37 (a look-back time of ~4 billion years). The HI 21-cm emission from these galaxies was measured by coadding their signals using precise optical redshifts obtained with the Anglo-Australian Telescope. The average HI mass measured for all 324 galaxies is (6.6 +- 3.5)x10^9 solar masses, while the average HI mass measured for the 105 optically blue galaxies is (19.0 +- 6.5)x10^9 solar masses. The significant quantities of gas found around Abell 370, suggest that there has been substantial evolution in the gas content of galaxy clusters since redshift z = 0.37. The total amount of HI gas found around Abell 370 is up to ~8 times more than that seen around the Coma cluster, a nearby galaxy cluster of similar size. Despite this higher gas content, Abell 370 shows the same trend as nearby clusters, that galaxies close to the cluster core have lower HI gas content than galaxies further away. The Abell 370 galaxies have HI mass to optical light ratios similar to local galaxy samples and have the same correlation between their star formation rate and HI mass as found in nearby galaxies. The average star formation rate derived from [OII] emission and from de-redshifted 1.4 GHz radio continuum for the Abell 370 galaxies also follows the correlation found in the local universe. The large amounts of HI gas found around the cluster can easily be consumed by the observed star formation rate in the galaxies over the ~4 billion years (from z = 0.37) to the present day.

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arXiv2009

Probing Turbulence in the Interstellar Medium of Galaxies

The power spectrum of HI intensity fluctuation of the interstellar medium carries information of the turbulence dynamics therein. We present a method to estimate the power spectrum of HI intensity fluctuation using radio interferometric observations. The method involves correlating the visibilities in the u-v plane at different baselines. This method is particularly use full for evaluating the power spectrum for the faint dwarf galaxies. We apply this method to 3 spiral galaxies and 5 dwarf galaxies. The measured power spectrum seem to follow a power law P_HI(U) = A U^α, suggesting turbulence to be operational. Further, depending on the slope of the power spectrum, we expect the presence of 2D and 3D turbulence in those galaxies.

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arXiv2009

A Study of ISM of Dwarf Galaxies Using HI Power Spectrum Analysis

We estimate the power spectrum of HI intensity fluctuations for a sample of 8 galaxies (7 dwarf and one spiral). The power spectrum can be fitted to a power law P_HI(U) = A U^αfor 6 of these galaxies, indicating turbulence is operational. The estimated best fit value for the slope ranges from ~ -1.5 (AND IV, NGC 628, UGC 4459 and GR 8) to ~ -2.6 (DDO 210 and NGC 3741). We interpret this bi-modality as being due to having effectively 2D turbulence on length scales much larger than the scale height of the galaxy disk and 3D otherwise. This allows us to use the estimated slope to set bounds on the scale heights of the face-on galaxies in our sample. We also find that the power law slope remains constant as we increase the channel thickness for all these galaxies, suggesting that the fluctuations in HI intensity are due to density fluctuations and not velocity fluctuations, or that the slope of the velocity structure function is ~ 0. Finally, for the four galaxies with "2D turbulence" we find that the slope αcorrelates with the star formation rate per unit area, with larger star formation rates leading to steeper power laws. Given our small sample size this result needs to be confirmed with a larger sample.

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arXiv2009

The Scale Height of NGC 1058 Measured from its HI Power Spectrum

We have measured the HI power spectrum of the nearly face-on spiral galaxy NGC 1058 from radio-interferometric observations using a visibility based estimator. The power spectrum is well fitted by two different power laws $P(U)=AU^α$, one with $α=- 2.5\pm 0.6$ at small length-scales $(600 {\rm pc} {\rm to} 1.5 {\rm kpc})$ and another with $α=- 1.0\pm 0.2$ at large length-scales $(1.5 {\rm kpc} {\rm to} 10.0 {\rm kpc})$. We interpret this change in the slope of the power spectrum as a transition from 3D turbulence at small length-scales to 2D turbulence in the plane of the galaxy's disk at large length-scales. We use the observed break in the power spectrum to estimate the galaxy's scale-height, which we find to be $ 490 \pm 90 $ pc.

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arXiv2009

HI in very metal-poor galaxies: the SBS 0335-052 system

We present Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope (GMRT), HI 21cm observations of SBS 0335-052E and SBS 0335-052W, a close pair of dwarf galaxies, which are further unusual in being the most metal-poor star-forming galaxies known. We present images at several angular resolutions, ranging from ~40 to 4 arcsec. These images show that SBS 0335-052 is a strongly interacting system, with a faint diffuse HI bridge seen at low resolution, and elongated tails seen at the higher resolutions. The overall morphology suggests that the pair represents a major merger of extremely gas-rich galaxies. The low-resolution velocity field is dominated by the velocity difference between the two galaxies and the velocity gradient along the tidal features. However, for SBS 0335-052W at least, at high angular resolution, one sees a central velocity field that could be associated with the spin of the original undisturbed disc. The highest angular resolution HI images show that the ionized superbubble, identified by Thuan, Izotov & Lipovetsky (1997), in the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) images of SBS 0335-052E, is extended along one of the diffuse tidal features, and that there is a high-density HI clump at the other end of the superbubble. The star formation in SBS 0335-052E occurs mainly in a group of superstar clusters (SSCs) with a clear age gradient; the age decreases as one approaches the dense HI clump. We suggest that this propagating star formation is driven by the superbubble expanding into a medium with a tidally-produced density gradient. The high pressures associated with the compressed material would also naturally explain why current star formation is mainly concentrated in superstar clusters.

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arXiv2009

Star formation in extremely faint dwarf galaxies

We study the relationship between the gas column density (derived from GMRT 21 cm data) and the star formation rate surface density (derived from publicly available GALEX data) for a sample of 23 extremely faint dwarf irregular galaxies drawn from the Faint Irregular Galaxy GMRT Survey (FIGGS). Our sample galaxies have a median HI mass of 2.8e07 solar masses and a median blue magnitude -13.2. We find that gas column density averaged over the star forming region of the disk lies below most estimates of the "threshold density" for star formation, and that the average star formation rate surface density for most of the galaxies is also lower than would be expected from the "Kennicutt-Schmidt" law (Kennnicutt 1998}. We also use our data to look for small scale (400 pc and 200 pc) correlations. At 400 pc linear resolution, for 18 of our 23 galaxies, we find that star formation rate surface density can be parametrized as having a power law dependence on gas column density, which varies accross the sample and is in general steeper than "Kennicutt-Schmidt" law. The power law relation holds until one reaches the sensitivity limit of the GALEX data, i.e. we find no evidence for a "threshold density" below which star formation is completely cut off. For the 5 galaxies for which a power law does not provide a good parametrization, there are substantial offsets between the UV bright regions and the HI high column density maps. At 200 pc resolution, the offsets between the peaks in the HI and UV images are more pronounced, and a power law parametrization is possible for only 5 of 10 galaxies.

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arXiv2008

HI and star formation in the most metal-deficient galaxies

We present Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope (GMRT) observations for three (viz., DDO 68, SDSS J2104-0035 and UGC 772) of the six most metal-deficient actively star-forming galaxies known. Although there is a debate as to whether these galaxies are undergoing their first episode of star formation or not, they are `young' in the sense that their ISM is chemically unevolved. In this regard, they are the nearest equivalents of young galaxies in the early Universe. All three galaxies, that we have observed, have irregular HI morphologies and kinematics, which we interpret as either due to tidal interaction with neighbouring galaxies, or the consequences of a recent merger. The remaining three of the six most metal-deficient galaxies are also known to have highly disturbed HI distributions and are interacting. It is interesting because these galaxies were chosen solely on the basis of their metallicity and not for any particular signs of interaction. In this sense (i.e., their gas has not yet had time to settle into a regular disc), one could regard these extremely metal deficient (XMD) galaxies as `young'. The current star formation episode is likely to have been triggered by interaction/merger. It is also possible that the tidal interaction has lead to enhanced mixing with metal-poor gas in outer disc, and hence to a low gas-phase metallicity in the central star-forming regions. We also find that in general these galaxies do not show a one-to-one correspondence between regions of high HI column density and regions with current star formation. However, to the extent that one can define a threshold density, its value (~10^{21} atoms cm^{-2}) is similar to that in galaxies with much higher metallicity.

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arXiv2008

Turbulence measurements from HI absorption spectra

We use the millennium Arecibo 21 cm absorption-line survey measurements to examine the issue of the non-thermal contribution to the observed Galactic HI line widths. If we assume a simple, constant pressure model for the HI in the Galaxy, we find that the non-thermal contribution to the line width, v_{nt} scales as v^2_{nt} \propto l^α, for v_{nt} larger than \sim 0.7 km s^{-1}. Here l is a derived length scale and α\sim 0.7 \pm 0.1. This is consistent with what one would expect from a turbulent medium with a Kolmogorov scaling. Such a scaling is also predicted by theoretical models and numerical simulations of turbulence in a magnetized medium. For non-thermal line widths narrower than \sim 0.7 km s^{-1}, this scaling breaks down, and we find that the likely reason is ambiguities arising from Gaussian decomposition of intrinsically narrow, blended lines. We use the above estimate of the non-thermal contribution to the line width to determine corrected HI kinetic temperature. The new limits that we obtain imply that a significantly smaller (\sim 40% as opposed to 60%) fraction of the atomic interstellar medium in our Galaxy is in the warm neutral medium phase.

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arXiv2008

FIGGS: Faint Irregular Galaxies GMRT Survey - Overview, observations and first results

The Faint Irregular Galaxies GMRT Survey (FIGGS) is a Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope (GMRT) based HI imaging survey of a systematically selected sample of extremely faint nearby dwarf irregular galaxies. The primary goal of FIGGS is to provide a comprehensive and statistically robust characterization of the neutral inter-stellar medium properties of faint, gas rich dwarf galaxies. The FIGGS galaxies represent the extremely low-mass end of the dwarf irregular galaxies population, with a median M${\rm{_B\sim-13.0}}$ and median HI mass of $\sim 3 \times 10^7$ M$_\odot$, extending the baseline in mass and luminosity space for a comparative study of galaxy properties. The HI data is supplemented with observations at other wavelengths. In addition, distances accurate to ~ 10% are available for most of the sample galaxies. This paper gives an introduction to FIGGS, describe the GMRT observations and presents the first results from the HI observations. From the FIGGS data we confirm the trend of increasing HI to optical diameter ratio with decreasing optical luminosity; the median ratio of D$_{\rm HI}$/D$_{\rm Ho}$ for the FIGGS sample is 2.4. Further, on comparing our data with aperture synthesis surveys of bright spirals, we find at best marginal evidence for a decrease in average surface density with decreasing HI mass. To a good approximation the disks of gas rich galaxies, ranging over 3 orders of magnitude in HI mass, can be described as being drawn from a family with constant HI surface density.

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arXiv2008

Baryonic Tully-Fisher Relation for Extremely Low Mass Galaxies

We study Tully-Fisher relations for a sample that combines extremely faint (M_B > -14.0) galaxies along with bright (i.e. L_*) galaxies. Accurate (~ 10%) distances, I band photometry, and B-V colors are known for the majority of the galaxies in our sample. The faint galaxies are drawn from the Faint Irregular Galaxy GMRT survey (FIGGS), and we have HI rotation velocities derived from aperture synthesis observations for all of them. For the faint galaxies, we find that even though the median HI and stellar masses are comparable, the HI mass correlates significantly better with the circular velocity indicators than the stellar mass. We also find that W$_{20}$ correlates better with mass than the rotation velocity, although the difference is not statistically significant. The faint galaxies lie systematically below the I band TF relation defined by bright galaxies, and also show significantly more intrinsic scatter. This implies that the integrated star formation in these galaxies has been both less efficient and also less regulated than in large galaxies. We find that while the faint end deviation is greatly reduced in Baryonic Tully-Fisher (BTF) relations, the existence of a break at the faint end of the BTF is subject to systematics such as the assumed stellar mass to light ratio. If we assume that there is an intrinsic BTF and try to determine the baryonic mass by searching for prescriptions that lead to the tightest BTF, we find that scaling the HI mass leads to a much more significant tightening than scaling the stellar mass to light ratio. The most significant tightening that we find however, is if we scale the entire baryonic mass of the faint (but not the bright) galaxies. Such a scenario would be consistent with models where dwarf (but not large) galaxies have a large fraction of dark or ``missing'' baryons (Slightly abridged)

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arXiv2008

Foregrounds for redshifted 21 cm studies of reionization: GMRT 153 MHz observations

Foreground subtraction is the biggest challenge for future redshifted 21 cm observations to probe reionization. We use a short GMRT observation at 153 MHz to characterize the statistical properties of the background radiation across ~ one degree to sub-arcminutes angular scales, and across a frequency band of 5 MHz with 62.5 kHz resolution. The statistic we use is the visibility correlation function, or equivalently the angular power spectrum C_l. We present the results obtained from using relatively unsophisticated, conventional data calibration procedures. We find that even fairly simple minded calibration allows one to estimate the visibility correlation function at a given frequency V_2(U,0). From our observations we find that V_2(U,0) is consistent with foreground model predictions at all angular scales except the largest ones probed by our observations where the the model predictions are somewhat in excess. On the other hand the visibility correlation between different frequencies kappa(U, Delta nu), seems to be much more sensitive to calibration errors. We find a rapid decline in kappa(U, Delta nu), in contrast with the prediction of less than 1 % variation across 2.5 MHz. In this case however, it seems likely that a substantial part of the discrepancy may be due to limitations of data reduction procedures.

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