arXiv subjects

Kanak Saha

Publications and source records attributed to Kanak Saha.

At least 73 records · Page 4Linked to original sources

arXiv2021

The central region of the enigmatic Malin 1

Malin 1, being a class of giant low surface galaxies, continues to surprise us even today. The HST/F814W observation has shown that the central region of Malin 1 is more like a normal SB0/a galaxy, while the rest of the disk has the characteristic of a low surface brightness system. The AstroSat/UVIT observations suggest scattered recent star formation activity all over the disk, especially along the spiral arms. The central 9" ($\sim 14$ kpc) region, similar to the size of the Milky Way's stellar disk, has a number of far-UV clumps - indicating recent star-formation activity. The high resolution UVIT/F154W image reveals far-UV emission within the bar region ($\sim 4$ kpc) - suggesting the presence of hot, young stars in the bar. These young stars from the bar region are perhaps responsible for producing the strong emission lines such as H$α$, [OII] seen in the SDSS spectra. Malin 1B, a dwarf early-type galaxy, is interacting with the central region and probably responsible for inducing the recent star-formation activity in this galaxy.

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arXiv2020

AstroSat detection of Lyman continuum emission from a z=1.42 galaxy

One of the outstanding problems of current observational cosmology is to understand the nature of sources that produced the bulk of the ionizing radiation after the Cosmic Dark Age. Direct detection of these reionization sources is practically infeasible at high redshift due to the steep decline of intergalactic medium transmission. However, a number of low-redshift analogs emitting Lyman continuum at~900 Angstrom ~restframe are now detected at $z< 0.4$ and there are detections in the range $ 2.5< z< 3.5$ also. Here, we report the detection of Lyman continuum emission with a high escape fraction (>20%) from a low-mass clumpy galaxy at z=1.42, in the middle of the redshift range where no detection has been made before and near the peak of the Cosmic Star-formation history. The observation was made in the Hubble Extreme Deep field by the wide-field Ultra-Violet-Imaging Telescope onboard AstroSat. This is the first detection of Extreme Ultraviolet radiation from a distant galaxy at a rest-frame wavelength of 600 Angstrom, and it opens up a new window to constrain the shape of the ionization spectrum. Further observations with AstroSat should significantly increase the sample of Lyman continuum leaking galaxies at Cosmic Noon.

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arXiv2020

Wobbly discs -- corrugations seen in the dust lanes of edge-on galaxies

We report the detection of small scale bending waves, also known as corrugations, in the dust lanes of five nearby edge-on disc galaxies. This phenomenon, where the disc mid-plane bends to become wavy, just as in warps but on a smaller scale, is seen here for the first time, in the dust lanes running across the discs. Because they are seen in absorption, this feature must be present in the dust disc in the outskirts of these galaxies. We enhance the visibility of these features using unsharp masking, trace the dust mid-plane across the disc, measure the corrugation amplitude by eye and the corrugation wavelength using Fourier analysis. The corrugation amplitude is found to be in the range of 70 - 200 pc and the wavelengths lie between 1 - 5 kpc. In this limited sample, we find that the amplitude of the corrugations tends to be larger for lower mass galaxies, whereas the wavelength of corrugation does not seem to depend on the mass of host galaxies. Linear stability analysis is performed to find out the dynamical state of these dust discs. Based on WKB analysis, we find that the dust corrugations in about half of our sample are stable. Further analysis, on a larger sample would be useful to strengthen the above results.

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arXiv2020

Bar rejuvenation in S0 galaxies?

Based on the colour measurements from a multi-band, multi-component 2D decomposition's of S0 and spiral galaxies using SDSS images, we found that bars are bluer in S0 galaxies compared to the spiral galaxies. Most of the S0s in our sample have stellar masses $\sim L_{*}$ galaxies. The environment might have played an important role as most of the S0s with bluer bars are in the intermediate-density environment. The possibility of minor mergers and tidal interactions which occurs frequently in the intermediate-density environment might have caused either a bar to form and/or induce star formation in the barred region of S0 galaxies. The underlying discs show the usual behaviour being redder in S0s compared to spiral galaxies while the bulges are red and old for both S0 and spiral galaxies. The finding of bluer bars in S0 galaxies is a puzzling issue and poses an interesting question at numerical and theoretical studies most of which shows that the bars are long-lived structures with old stellar populations.

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arXiv2019

Narrowband H$α$ imaging of nearby Wolf-Rayet galaxies

We present narrowband H$α$ imaging of nearby Wolf-Rayet (WR) galaxies known as a subset of starburst galaxies. The H$α$ images have been used to show morphology of star-forming regions in galaxies, which leads to speculate that the studied galaxies have most likely experienced merger or interaction with low luminous dwarf galaxies or \HI clouds. We further derive the H$α$ based star formation rates (SFRs) in galaxies using our H$α$ observations. These SFRs are well-correlated with SFRs derived using other indicators at far-ultraviolet, far-infrared and 1.4-GHz radio wavebands. It is noticed that the infrared excess (IRX) method gives the best SFR estimates, consistent with different models predication. These models also predict that the sample galaxies have probably gone through a continuous star formation at least for 1 Gyr over which the recent (< 10 Myr) star formation has taken place in WR phase. This study presents Main-Sequence (MS) relation for nearby WR galaxies for the first time. This derived MS relation is found to be similar to previously known MS relation for normal nearby star-forming galaxies, suggesting that WR systems evolve in a similar fashion as normal star-forming galaxies evolve.

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arXiv2019

Formation of disc galaxies around z~2

We present combined evolution of morphological and stellar properties of galaxies on the two sides of z=2 (2.0 2 to ~70% for z<2, compensating for the fall in population of pure discs and pure spheroids. All quiescent outliers of our full sample on the main-sequence, are 2-component systems, belonging to the lower redshift range (z<2). The doubling of stellar mass of 2-component systems and decrease in their SFR by the same factor, suggests that mechanisms involved in morphological transformations are also responsible for the quenching of their star formation activity. Interestingly, while there is substantial increase in the size (~2.5 times) and mass (~5 times) of pure discs, from z>2 to z<2, pure spheroids maintain roughly the same values. Additionally, while bulge hosting discs witness an expansion in scale length (~1.3 times), their bulge sizes as well as bulge to total light ratio see no evolution, suggesting that z~2 is pre-dominantly a disc formation period.

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arXiv2018

Forming Lenticular Galaxies via Violent Disk Instability

Lenticular galaxies are generally thought to have descended from spirals via morphological transformation, although recent numerical simulations have shown that minor or even major merger can also lead to an S0-like remnant. These mechanisms, however, are active in a dense environment such as a group or a cluster of galaxies - making it harder to explain the remarkable fraction of S0s found in the field. Here, we propose a new mechanism to form such lenticular galaxies. We show that an isolated cold disk settled into rotational equilibrium becomes violently unstable - leading to fragmentation and formation of stellar clumps that, in turn, not only grow the bulge, but also increase the stellar disk velocity dispersion optimally in less than a billion year. Subsequently, the galaxy evolves passively without any conspicuous spiral structure. The final galaxy models resemble remarkably well the morphology and stellar kinematics of the present-day S0s observed by the Planetary Nebulae spectrograph. Our findings suggest a natural link between the high-redshift clumpy progenitors to the present-day S0 galaxies.

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arXiv2018

Structural properties of faint low surface brightness galaxies

We study the structural properties of Low Surface Brightness galaxies (LSB) using a sample of 263 galaxies observed by the Green Bank Telescope (Schneider et al 1992). We perform 2D decompositions of these galaxies in the SDSS $g$, $r$ and $i$ bands using the GALFIT software. Our decomposition reveals that about $60\%$ of these galaxies are bulgeless i.e., their light distributions are well modelled by pure exponential disks. The rest of the galaxies were fitted with two components: a Sersic bulge and an exponential disk. Most of these galaxies have bulge-to-total (B/T) ratio less than 0.1. However, of these 104 galaxies, $20\%$ have $B/T > 0.1$ i.e., hosting significant bulge component and they are more prominent amongst the fainter LSBs. According to $g - r$ colour criteria, most of the LSB galaxies in our sample are blue, with only 7 classified as red LSBs. About $15\%$ of the LSB galaxies (including both blue and red) in our sample host stellar bars. The incidence of bars is more prominent in relatively massive blue LSB galaxies with very high gas fraction. These findings may provide important clues to the formation and evolution of LSB galaxies - in particular on the bar/bulge formation in faint LSB disks.

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arXiv2018

Bright Compact Bulges (BCBs) at intermediate redshifts

Studying bright ($M_B<-20$), intermediate-redshift ($0.4<z<1.0$), disc dominated ($n_B<2.5$) galaxies from HST/ACS and WFC3 in Chandra Deep Field South, in rest-frame B and I-band, we found a new class of bulges which is brighter and more compact than ellipticals. We refer to them as "Bright, Compact Bulges" (BCBs) - they resemble neither classical nor pseudo-bulges and constitute $\sim12$% of the total bulge population at these redshifts. Examining free-bulge $+$ disc decomposition sample and elliptical galaxy sample from Simard et al. (2011), we find that only $\sim0.2$% of the bulges can be classified as BCBs in the local Universe. Bulge to total ratio $(B/T)$ of disc galaxies with BCBs is (at $\sim0.4$) a factor of $\sim2$ and $\sim4$ larger than for those with classical and pseudo bulges. BCBs are $\sim2.5$ and $\sim6$ times more massive than classical and pseudo bulges. Although disc galaxies with BCBs host the most massive and dominant bulge type, their specific star formation rate is $1.5-2$ times higher than other disc galaxies. This is contrary to the expectations that a massive compact bulge would lead to lower star formation rates. We speculate that our BCB host disc galaxies are descendant of massive, compact and passive elliptical galaxies observed at higher redshifts. Those high redshift ellipticals lack local counterparts and possibly evolved by acquiring a compact disc around them. The overall properties of BCBs supports a picture of galaxy assembly in which younger discs are being accreted around massive pre-existing spheroids.

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arXiv2018

Why are some galaxies not barred?

Although more than two-thirds of star-forming disk galaxies in the local universe are barred, some galaxies remain un-barred, occupying the upper half of the Hubble tuning fork diagram. Numerical simulations almost always produce bars spontaneously, so it remains a challenge to understand how galaxies sometimes prevent bars from forming. Using a set of collisionless simulations, we first reproduce the common result that cold stellar disks surrounding a classical bulge become strongly unstable to non-axisymmetric perturbations, leading to the rapid formation of spiral structure and bars. However, our analyses show that galaxy models with compact classical bulges (whose average density is greater than or comparable to the disk density calculated within bulge half-mass radii) are able to prevent bar formation for at least 4 Gyr even when the stellar disk is maximal and having low Toomre Q. Such bar prevention is the result of several factors such as (a) a small inner Lindblad resonance with a high angular rate, which contaminates an incipient bar with $x_2$ orbits, (b) rapid loss of angular momentum accompanied by a rapid heating in the center from initially strong bar and spiral instabilities in a low-Q disk, in other words, a rapid initial rise to a value larger than $\sim5$ of the ratio of the random energy to the rotational energy in the central region of the galaxy.

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arXiv2017

Building the peanut: simulations and observations of peanut-shaped structures and ansae in face-on disk galaxies

(X/peanut)-shaped features observed in a significant fraction of disk galaxies are thought to have formed from vertically buckled bars. Despite being three dimensional structures, they are preferentially detected in near edge-on projection. Only a few galaxies are found to have displayed such structures when their disks are relatively face-on - suggesting that either they are generally weak in face-on projection or many may be hidden by the light of their galaxy's face-on disk. Here we report on three (collisionless) simulated galaxies displaying peanut-shaped structures when their disks are seen both face-on and edge-on - resembling a three-dimensional peanut or dumbbell. Furthermore, these structures are accompanied by ansae and an outer ring at the end of the bar --- as seen in real galaxies such as IC~5240. The same set of quantitative parameters used to measure peanut structures in real galaxies have been determined for the simulated galaxies, and a broad agreement is found. In addition, the peanut length grows in tandem with the bar, and is a maximum at half the length of the bar. Beyond the cutoff of these peanut structures, towards the end of the bar, we discover a new positive/negative feature in the $B_6$ radial profile associated with the isophotes of the ansae/ring. Our simulated, self-gravitating, three-dimensional peanut structures display cylindrical rotation even in the near-face-on disk projection. In addition, we report on a kinematic pinch in the velocity map along the bar minor-axis, matching that seen in the surface density map.

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arXiv2017

Growth of bulges in disc galaxies since $z\sim1$

We investigate the growth of bulges in bright ($M_B<-20$) disc galaxies since $z\sim1$, in rest-frame B and I-band, using images from HST ACS and WFC3 in GOODS-South for high redshifts ($0.4<z<1.0$) and SDSS for local ($0.02<z<0.05$). The growth history has been traced by performing two-component bulge-disc decomposition and further classifying the bulges into pseudos and classicals using Kormendy relation. We have about $27\%$ pseudo and $40\%$ classical bulges in our sample. Classical bulges are brighter than pseudo, in both rest-bands, at all redshifts probed here; in fact since $z\sim0.77$, classical are about $\sim1$ mag brighter than pseudo bulges. Both bulges have witnessed substantial growth, more than half of their present day stellar mass has been gained since $z\sim1$. Their host discs have grown concurrently, becoming progressively brighter in rest-frame I-band. The high redshift host discs of both pseudo and classical bulges are found to be equally clumpy in rest-frame B-band. In the same band, we found that the growth of classical bulges is accompanied by fading of their host discs - which might be an indication of secular processes in action. However, both host disc as well as the bulge have grown substantially in terms of stellar mass. Our analysis suggests that, clump migration and secular processes alone can not account for the bulge growth, since $z\sim1$, accretion and minor mergers would be required.

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arXiv2016

Which bulges are favoured by barred S0 galaxies?

S0 galaxies are known to host classical bulges with a broad range of size and mass, while some such S0s are barred and some not. The origin of the bars has remained as a long-standing problem -- what made bar formation possible in certain S0s? By analysing a large sample of S0s with classical bulges observed by the Spitzer space telescope, we find that most of our barred S0s host comparatively low-mass classical bulges, typically with bulge-to-total ratio ($B/T$) less than $0.5$; whereas S0s with more massive classical bulges than these do not host any bar. Furthermore, we find that amongst the barred S0s, there is a trend for the longer and massive bars to be associated with comparatively bigger and massive classical bulges -- possibly suggesting bar growth being facilitated by these classical bulges. In addition, we find that the bulge effective radius is always less than the bar effective radius --indicating an interesting synergy between the host classical bulge and bars being maintained while bar growth occurred in these S0s.

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arXiv2016

Long-Lived Spiral Structure for Galaxies with Intermediate Size Bulges

Spiral structure in disk galaxies is modeled with nine collisionless N-body simulations including live disks, halos, and bulges with a range of masses. Two of these simulations make long-lasting and strong two-arm spiral wave modes that last for $\sim5$ Gyr with constant pattern speed. These two had a light stellar disk and the largest values of the Toomre $Q$ parameter in the inner region at the time the spirals formed, suggesting the presence of a Q-barrier to wave propagation resulting from the bulge. The relative bulge mass in these cases is about 10\%. Models with weak two-arm spirals had pattern speeds that followed the radial dependence of the Inner Lindblad Resonance.

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arXiv2016

Survival of pure disk galaxies over the last 8 billion years

Pure disk galaxies without any bulge component, i.e., neither classical nor pseudo, seem to have escaped the affects of merger activity inherent to hierarchical galaxy formation models as well as strong internal secular evolution. We discover that a significant fraction (15 - 18 %) of disk galaxies in the Hubble Deep Field (0.4 < z < 1.0) as well as in the local Universe (0.02 < z < 0.05) are such pure disk systems (hereafter, PDS). The spatial distribution of light in these PDS is well described by a single exponential function from the outskirts to the centre and appears to have remained intact over the last 8 billion years keeping the mean central surface brightness and scale-length nearly constant. These two disk parameters of PDS are brighter and shorter, respectively, than of those disks which are part of disk galaxies with bulges. Since the fraction of PDS as well as their profile defining parameters do not change, it indicates that these galaxies have not witnessed either major mergers or multiple minor mergers since z~1. However, there is substantial increase in their total stellar mass and total size over the same time range. This suggests that smooth accretion of cold gas via cosmic filaments is the most probable mode of their evolution. We speculate that PDS are dynamically hotter and cushioned in massive dark matter halos which may prevent them from undergoing strong secular evolution.

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arXiv2015

Spin-up of massive classical bulges during secular evolution

Classical bulges in spiral galaxies are known to rotate but the origin of this observed rotational motion is not well understood. It has been shown recently that a low-mass classical bulge (ClB) in a barred galaxy can acquire rotation from absorbing a significant fraction of the angular momentum emitted by the bar. Our aim here is to investigate whether bars can spin up also more massive ClBs during the secular evolution of the bar, and to study the kinematics and dynamics of these ClBs. We use a set of self-consistent N-body simulations to study the interaction of ClBs with a bar that forms self-consistently in the disk. We use orbital spectral analysis to investigate the angular momentum gain by the classical bulge stars. We show that the ClBs gain, on average, about 2 - 6% of the disk's initial angular momentum within the bar region. Most of this angular momentum gain occurs via low-order resonances, particularly 5:2 resonant orbits. A density wake forms in the ClB which corotates and aligns with the bar at the end of the evolution. The spin-up process creates a characteristic linear rotation profile and mild tangential anisotropy in the ClB. The induced rotation is small in the centre but significant beyond $\sim2$ bulge half mass radii, where it leads to mass-weighted $V/σ\sim 0.2$, and reaches a local $V_{max}/σ_{in} \sim 0.5$ at around the scale of the bar. The resulting $V/σ$ is tightly correlated with the ratio of the bulge size to the bar size. In all models, a box/peanut bulge forms suggesting that composite bulges may be common. Bar-bulge resonant interaction in barred galaxies can provide some spin up of massive ClBs, but the process appears to be less efficient than for low-mass ClBs. Further angular momentum transfer due to nuclear bars or gas inflow would be required to explain the observed rotation if it is not primordial.

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arXiv2015

Lost in secular evolution: the case of a low mass classical bulge

The existence of a classical bulge in disk galaxies holds important clue to the assembly history of galaxies. Finding observational evidence of very low mass classical bulges particularly in barred galaxies including our Milky Way, is a challenging task as the bar driven secular evolution might bring significant dynamical change to these bulges alongside the stellar disk. Using high-resolution N-body simulation, we show that if a cool stellar disk is assembled around a non-rotating low-mass classical bulge, the disk rapidly grows a strong bar within a few rotation time scales. Later, the bar driven secular process transform the initial classical bulge into a flattened rotating stellar system whose central part also have grown a bar-like component rotating in sync with the disk bar. During this time, a boxy/peanut (hereafter, B/P) bulge is formed via the buckling instability of the disk bar and the vertical extent of this B/P bulge being slightly higher than that of the classical bulge, it encompasses the whole classical bulge. The resulting composite bulge appears to be both photometrically and kinematically identical to a B/P bulge without any obvious signature of the classical component. Our analysis suggest that many barred galaxies in the local universe might be hiding such low-mass classical bulges. We suggest that stellar population and chemodynamical analysis might be required in establishing the evidence for such low-mass classical bulges.

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arXiv2015

The evolution of disc galaxies with and without classical bulges since z~1

Establishing the relative role of internally and externally driven mechanisms responsible for disc and bulge growth is essential to understand the evolution of disc galaxies. In this context, we have studied the physical properties of disc galaxies without classical bulges in comparison to those with classical bulges since z~0.9. Using images from the Hubble Space Telescope and Sloan Digital Sky Survey, we have computed both parametric and non-parametric measures, and examined the evolution in size, concentration, stellar mass, effective stellar mass density and asymmetry. We find that both disc galaxies with and without classical bulges have gained more than 50% of their present stellar mass over the last ~8 Gyrs. Also, the increase in disc size is found to be peripheral. While the average total (Petrosian) radius almost doubles from z~0.9 to z~0, the average effective radius undergoes a marginal increase in comparison. Additionally, increase in the density of the inner region is evident through the evolution of both concentration and effective stellar mass density. We find that the asymmetry index falls from higher to lower redshifts, but this is more pronounced for the bulgeless disc sample. Also, asymmetry correlates with the global effective radius, and concentration correlates with the global Sersic index, but better so for higher redshifts only. The substantial increase in mass and size indicates that accretion of external material has been a dominant mode of galaxy growth, where the circumgalactic environment plays a significant role.

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