arXiv subjects

Qiu-Sheng Gu

Publications and source records attributed to Qiu-Sheng Gu.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2024

Galaxies with Biconical Ionized Structure in MaNGA - I. Sample Selection and Driven Mechanisms

Based on the integral field unit (IFU) data from Mapping Nearby Galaxies at Apache Point Observatory (MaNGA) survey, we develop a new method to select galaxies with biconical ionized structures, building a sample of 142 edge-on biconical ionized galaxies. We classify these 142 galaxies into 81 star-forming galaxies, 31 composite galaxies, and 30 AGNs (consisting of 23 Seyferts and 7 LI(N)ERs) according to the {\nii}-BPT diagram. The star-forming bicones have bar-like structures while AGN bicones display hourglass structures, and composite bicones exhibit transitional morphologies between them due to both black hole and star-formation activities. Star-forming bicones have intense star-formation activities in their central regions, and the primary driver of biconical structures is the central star formation rate surface density. The lack of difference in the strength of central black hole activities (traced by dust attenuation corrected {\oiii}$λ$5007 luminosity and Eddington ratio) between Seyfert bicones and their control samples can be naturally explained as that the accretion disk and the galactic disk are not necessarily coplanar. Additionally, the biconical galaxies with central LI(N)ER-like line ratios are edge-on disk galaxies that show strong central dust attenuation. The radial gradients of {\ha} surface brightness follow the $r^{-2.35}$ relation, roughly consistent with $r^{-2}$ profile, which is expected in the case of photoionization by a central point-like source. These observations indicate obscured AGNs or AGN echoes as the primary drivers of biconical structures in LI(N)ERs.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2024

Properties of a Fading AGN from SDSS-IV MaNGA

We identify a fading AGN SDSS J220141.64+115124.3 from the internal Product Launch-11 (MPL-11) in Mapping Nearby Galaxies at Apache Point Observatory (MaNGA) survey. The central region with a projected radius of $\sim$2.4 kpc is characterized as LINER-like line ratios while the outskirts extended to $\sim$15 kpc show Seyfert-like line ratios. The [OIII]$λ$5007 luminosity of the Seyfert regions is a factor of 37 (2) higher than the LINER regions without (with) dust attenuation correction, suggesting that the AGN activity decreases at least $\sim$8 $\times$ 10$^3$ yrs ($\sim$2.4 kpc/light-speed) ago. We model the emission line spectra in the central region with double Gaussian components (a narrow core and a broad wing) and analyze the properties of each component. The narrow core component mostly co-rotates with the stellar disc, whereas the broad wing component with a median of the velocity dispersion $\sim$300 km s$^{-1}$ is related to a wind outflow. The kinematic position angle (PA) of the ionized gas shows a $\sim$20° twist from the galaxy center to 1.5 effective radius. The median of the PA difference between the gas and stellar components is as large as $\sim$50° within 0.4 effective radius. The tidal feature in DESI image and star-gas misalignment suggest this galaxy is a merger remnant. Combining all these observational results as well as public available X-ray and MIR luminosities, we confirm this is a fading AGN, the merger process kick-started the central engine to quasar phase which ionized gas composed of tidal debris, and now the activity of the central black hole decreases. The discontinuity in [OIII]$λ$5007 flux and EQW maps is due to multiple AGN outbursts triggered by merger remnant gas inflows.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2022

Systematic biases in determining dust attenuation curves through galaxy SED fitting

While the slope of the dust attenuation curve ($δ$) is found to correlate with effective dust attenuation ($A_V$) as obtained through spectral energy distribution (SED) fitting, it remains unknown how the fitting degeneracies shape this relation. We examine the degeneracy effects by fitting SEDs of a sample of local star-forming galaxies (SFGs) selected from the Galaxy And Mass Assembly survey, in conjunction with mock galaxy SEDs of known attenuation parameters. A well-designed declining starburst star formation history is adopted to generate model SED templates with intrinsic UV slope ($β_0$) spanning over a reasonably wide range. The best-fitting $β_0$ for our sample SFGs shows a wide coverage, dramatically differing from the limited range of $β_0<-2.2$ for a starburst of constant star formation. Our results show that strong degeneracies between $β_0$, $δ$, and $A_V$ in the SED fitting induce systematic biases leading to a false $A_V$--$δ$ correlation. Our simulation tests reveal that this relationship can be well reproduced even when a flat $A_V$--$δ$ relation is taken to build the input model galaxy SEDs. The variations in best-fitting $δ$ are dominated by the fitting errors. We show that assuming a starburst with constant star formation in SED fitting will result in a steeper attenuation curve, smaller degeneracy errors, and a stronger $A_V$--$δ$ relation. Our findings confirm that the $A_V$--$δ$ relation obtained through SED fitting is likely driven by the systematic biases induced by the fitting degeneracies between $β_0$, $δ$, and $A_V$.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2021

Observations of cold gas and star formation in dwarf S0 galaxies

Very little work has been done on star formation in dwarf lenticular galaxies (S0s). We present 2D-spectroscopic and millimetre observations made by Centro Astronomico Hispano Aleman (CAHA) 3.5 m optical and the IRAM-30 m millimetre telescopes, respectively, for a sample of four dwarf S0 galaxies with multiple star formation regions in the field environment. We find that although most of the sources deviate from the star forming main sequence relation, they all follow the Kennicutt-Schmidt law. After comparing the stellar and Halpha kinematics, we find that the velocity fields of both stars and ionized gas do not show regular motion and the velocity dispersions of stars and ionized gas are low in the regions with high star formation, suggesting these star-forming S0 galaxies still have significant rotation. This view can be supported by the result that most of these dwarf S0 galaxies are classified as fast rotators. The ratio of average atomic gas mass to stellar mass (~ 47%) is much greater than that of molecular gas mass to stellar mass (~ 1%). In addition, the gas-phase metallicities in the star-forming regions are lower than that of the non-star-forming regions. These results indicate that the extended star formation may originate from the combination of abundant atomic hydrogen, long dynamic time scale and low-density environment.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2021

PGC 38025: A Star-forming Lenticular Galaxy With an Off-nuclear Star-forming Core

Lenticular galaxies (S0s) were considered mainly as passive evolved spirals due to environmental effects for a long time; however, most S0s in the field cannot fit into this common scenario. In this work, we study one special case, SDSS J120237.07+642235.3 (PGC 38025), a star-forming field S0 galaxy with an off-nuclear blue core. We present optical integral field spectroscopic (IFS) observation with the 3.5 meter telescope at Calar Alto (CAHA) Observatory, and high-resolution millimeter observation with the NOrthern Extended Millimeter Array (NOEMA). We estimated the star formation rate (SFR = 0.446 $M_\odot yr^{-1}$) and gaseous metallicity (12 + log(O/H) = 8.42) for PGC 38025, which follows the star formation main sequence and stellar mass - metallicity relation. We found that the ionized gas and cold molecular gas in PGC 38025 show the same spatial distribution and kinematics, whilst rotating misaligned with stellar component. The off-nuclear blue core is locating at the same redshift as PGC 38025 and its optical spectrum suggest it is \rm H\,{\sc ii} region. We suggest that the star formation in PGC 38025 is triggered by a gas-rich minor merger, and the off-nuclear blue core might be a local star-formation happened during the accretion/merger process.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2020

The physical properties of S0 galaxy PGC 26218: the origin of starburst and star formation

We present 2D-spectroscopic observations from Centro Astronómico Hispano Alemán (CAHA) 3.5 m telescope and the millimetre observation from NOrthern Extended Millimeter Array (NOEMA) of the nearby S0 galaxy PGC 26218, which shows central star-formation activity and post-starburst outside in the disk. We estimate the star formation rate (SFR = $0.28\pm0.01$ $M_{\odot} \rm yr^{-1}$) and molecular gas mass ($\rm log\ $$M_{\rm H_{2}}=7.60\pm0.15\ M_{\odot}$) of PGC 26218 based on the extinction-corrected H$α$ emission line and the CO-$\rm H_{2}$ conversion factor ($α_{\rm CO}$) of the Milky Way, respectively. We find that PGC 26218 follows the star forming main sequence (SFMS) and the Kennicutt-Schmidt law. Comparing the kinematics of CO($J$=1-0), stars and H$α$, we find that the rotational axis of CO($J$=1-0) is 45$^{\circ}$ different from that of H$α$. In addition, the profile of the CO($J$=1-0) emission line shows asymmetry and has an inflow component of $\sim$ 46 $\rm km\ s^{-1}$. With the decomposition of the optical image, we confirm that PGC 26218 shows multiple nuclear structures. The projected offset between the most luminous optical center and the center of CO($J$=1-0) is $5.2\arcsec$ ($\sim$ 0.6 kpc) and the latter overlaps with one of the optical cores. These results support that PGC 26218 may have experienced a gas-rich minor merger, extending its star formation and locating it in the SFMS.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2018

Physical properties variation across the green valley for local galaxies

We have selected a sample of nearby galaxies from Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 7 (SDSS DR7) to investigate the physical properties variation from blue cloud to green valley to red sequence. The sample is limited in a narrow range in color-stellar mass diagram. After splitting green valley galaxies into two parts---a bluer green valley (green 1) and a redder one (green 2) and three stellar mass bins, we investigate the physical properties variation across the green valley region. Our main results are as following: (i) The percentages of pure bulge and bulge-dominated/elliptical galaxies increase gradually from blue cloud to red sequence while the percentages of pure disk and disk-dominated/spiral galaxies decrease gradually in all stellar mass bins and different environments; (ii) With the analysis of morphological and structural parameters (e.g., concentration (C) and the stellar mass surface density within the central 1Kpc ($Σ_{1}$)), red galaxies show the most luminous and compact cores than both green valley and blue galaxies while blue galaxies show the opposite behavior in all stellar mass bins. (iii) A strong negative (positive) relationship between bulge-to-total light ratio (B/T) and specific star formation rate (sSFR) ($D_{4000}$) is found from blue to red galaxies. Our results indicate that the growth of bulge plays an important role when the galaxies change from the blue cloud, to green valley, and to the red sequence.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2018

The MALATANG Survey: the L_gas-L_IR correlation on sub-kiloparsec scale in six nearby star-forming galaxies as traced by HCN J=4-3 and HCO^+ J=4-3

We present HCN J=4-3 and HCO^+ J=4-3 maps of six nearby star-forming galaxies, NGC 253, NGC 1068, IC 342, M82, M83, and NGC 6946, obtained with the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope as part of the MALATANG survey. All galaxies were mapped in the central 2 arcmin $\times$ 2 arcmin region at 14 arcsec (FWHM) resolution (corresponding to linear scales of ~ 0.2-1.0 kpc). The L_IR-L'_dense relation, where the dense gas is traced by the HCN J=4-3 and the HCO^+ J=4-3 emission, measured in our sample of spatially-resolved galaxies is found to follow the linear correlation established globally in galaxies within the scatter. We find that the luminosity ratio, L_IR/L'_dense, shows systematic variations with L_IR within individual spatially resolved galaxies, whereas the galaxy-integrated ratios vary little. A rising trend is also found between L_IR/L'_dense ratio and the warm-dust temperature gauged by the 70 μm/100 μm flux ratio. We find the luminosity ratios of IR/HCN(4-3) and IR/HCO^+(4-3), which can be taken as a proxy for the efficiency of star formation in the dense molecular gas (SFE_dense), appears to be nearly independent of the dense-gas fraction (f_dense) for our sample of galaxies. The SFE of the total molecular gas (SFE_mol) is found to increase substantially with f_dense when combining our data with that on local (ultra)luminous infrared galaxies and high-z quasars. The mean L'_HCN(4-3)/L'_HCO^+(4-3) line ratio measured for the six targeted galaxies is 0.9+/-0.6. No significant correlation is found for the L'_HCN(4-3)/L'_HCO^+(4-3) ratio with the SFR as traced by L_IR, nor with the warm-dust temperature, for the different populations of galaxies.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2018

The Physical Characteristics of Interstellar Medium in NGC 3665 with Herschel Observations

We present the analysis of the physical properties of the interstellar medium (ISM) in the nearby early-type galaxy NGC 3665, based on the far-infrared (FIR) photometric and spectroscopic data as observed by the Herschel Space Observatory. The fit to the spectral energy distribution reveals a high dust content in the galaxy, with the dust-to-stellar mass ratio of $M_{\rm dust}$/$M_\ast$ $\sim$ 1.1 $\times$ 10$^{-4}$ that is nearly three times larger than the mean value of local S0+S0a galaxies. For the ionized regions (H~\textsc{ii} regions), the electron density (n$_e$) is around 49.5 $\pm$ 11.9 cm$^{-3}$ based on the [N~\textsc{ii}]\,122\,\mum/[N~\textsc{ii}]\,205\,\mum\ ratio. For the photodissociation regions, the heating efficiency is in the range of 1.26 $\times$ 10$^{-3}$ and 1.37 $\times$ 10$^{-3}$ based on the ([C~\textsc{ii}$]+[$O~\textsc{i}]\,63\,\mum)/$L_{\rm TIR}$, which is slightly lower than other local galaxies; the hydrogen nucleus density and the strength of FUV radiation field are n $\sim$ 10$^{4}$ cm$^{-3}$ and G$_0$ $\sim$ 10$^{-0.25}$, respectively. The above results are consistent with the presence of weak AGN and a low level of star-forming activity in NGC 3665. Our results give strong support to the `morphological quenching' scenario, where a compact, massive bulge can stabilize amount of cool gas against star formation.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2017

The LAMOST Complete Spectroscopic Survey of Pointing Area (LaCoSSPAr) in the Southern Galactic Cap I. The Spectroscopic Redshift Catalog

We present a spectroscopic redshift catalog from the LAMOST Complete Spectroscopic Survey of Pointing Area (LaCoSSPAr) in the Southern Galactic Cap (SGC), which is designed to observe all sources (Galactic and extra-galactic) by using repeating observations with a limiting magnitude of $r=18.1~mag$ in two $20~deg^2$ fields. The project is mainly focusing on the completeness of LAMOST ExtraGAlactic Surveys (LEGAS) in the SGC, the deficiencies of source selection methods and the basic performance parameters of LAMOST telescope. In both fields, more than 95% of galaxies have been observed. A post-processing has been applied to LAMOST 1D spectrum to remove the majority of remaining sky background residuals. More than 10,000 spectra have been visually inspected to measure the redshift by using combinations of different emission/absorption features with uncertainty of $σ_{z}/(1+z)<0.001$. In total, there are 1528 redshifts (623 absorption and 905 emission line galaxies) in Field A and 1570 redshifts (569 absorption and 1001 emission line galaxies) in Field B have been measured. The results show that it is possible to derive redshift from low SNR galaxies with our post-processing and visual inspection. Our analysis also indicates that up to 1/4 of the input targets for a typical extra-galactic spectroscopic survey might be unreliable. The multi-wavelength data analysis shows that the majority of mid-infrared-detected absorption (91.3%) and emission line galaxies (93.3%) can be well separated by an empirical criterion of $W2-W3=2.4$. Meanwhile, a fainter sequence paralleled to the main population of galaxies has been witnessed both in $M_r$/$W2-W3$ and $M_*$/$W2-W3$ diagrams, which could be the population of luminous dwarf galaxies but contaminated by the edge-on/highly inclined galaxies ($\sim30\%$).

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2017

HC3N Observations of Nearby Galaxies

Aims. We aim to systematically study the properties of the different transitions of the dense molecular gas tracer HC3N in galaxies. Methods. We have conducted single-dish observations of HC3N emission lines towards a sample of nearby gas-rich galaxies. HC3N(J=2-1) was observed in 20 galaxies with Effelsberg 100-m telescope. HC3N(J=24-23) was observed in nine galaxies with the 10-m Submillimeter Telescope (SMT). Results. HC3 N 2-1 is detected in three galaxies: IC 342, M 66 and NGC 660 (> 3 σ). HC3 N 24-23 is detected in three galaxies: IC 342, NGC 1068 and IC 694. This is the first measurements of HC3N 2-1 in a relatively large sample of external galaxies, although the detection rate is low. For the HC3 N 2-1 non-detections, upper limits (2 σ) are derived for each galaxy, and stacking the non-detections is attempted to recover the weak signal of HC3N. But the stacked spectrum does not show any significant signs of HC3N 2-1 emission. The results are also compared with other transitions of HC3N observed in galaxies. Conclusions. The low detection rate of both transitions suggests low abundance of HC3N in galaxies, which is consistent with other observational studies. The comparison between HC3N and HCN or HCO+shows a large diversity in the ratios between HC3N and HCN or HCO+. More observations are needed to interpret the behavior of HC3N in different types of galaxies.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2016

Measuring Structural Parameters Through Stacking Galaxy Images

It remains challenging to detect the low surface brightness structures of faint high-z galaxies, which is key to understanding the structural evolution of galaxies. The technique of image stacking allows us to measure the averaged light profile beneath the detection limit and probe the extended structure of a group of galaxies. We carry out simulations to examine the recovery of the averaged surface brightness profile through stacking model HST/ACS images of a set of galaxies as functions of Sersic index (n), effective radius (Re) and axis ratio (AR). The Sersic profile best fitting the radial profile of the stacked image is taken as the recovered profile, in comparison with the intrinsic mean profile of the model galaxies. Our results show that, in general, the structural parameters of the mean profile can be properly determined through stacking, although systematic biases need to be corrected when spreads of Re and AR are counted. We find that Sersic index is slightly overestimated and Re is underestimated at AR < 0.5 as the stacked image appears to be more compact due to the presence of inclined galaxies; the spread of Re biases the stacked profile to have a higher Sersic index. We stress that the measurements of structural parameters through stacking should take these biases into account. We estimate the biases in the recovered structural parameters from stacks of galaxies when the samples have distributions of Re, AR and n seen in local galaxies.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2016

Boxy H$α$ Emission Profiles in Star-Forming Galaxies

We assemble a sample of disk star-forming galaxies from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 7, studying the structure of H$α$ emission lines, finding a large fraction of this sample contains boxy H$α$ line profiles. This fraction depends on galaxy physical and geometric parameters in the following way: (1) it increases monotonically with star formation rate per unit area ($Σ_{\rm SFR}$), and stellar mass ($M_*$), with the trend being much stronger with $M_*$, from $\sim$0% at $M_*=10^{10}M_{\odot}$ to about 50% at $M_*=10^{11}M_\odot$; (2) the fraction is much smaller in face-on systems than in edge-on systems. It increases with galaxy inclination ($i$) while $i < 60\,^{\circ}$ and is roughly a constant of 25% beyond this range; (3) for the sources which can be modeled well with two velocity components, blueshifted and redshifted from the systemic velocity, these is a positive correlation between the velocity difference of these two components and the stellar mass, with a slope similar to the Tully-Fisher relation; (4) the two components are very symmetric in the mean, both in velocity and in amplitude. The four findings listed above can be understood as a natural result of a rotating galaxy disk with a kpc-scale ring-like H$α$ emission region.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2015

Narrow absorption lines with two observations of Sloan Digital Sky Survey

We assemble 3524 quasars from Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) with repeated observations to search for variations of narrow C IV1548,1551 and Mg II2796,2803 absorption doublets in spectral regions shortward of 7000 Ang at the observed frame, which corresponds to time-scales of about 150 ~ 2643 days at quasar rest frame. In these quasar spectra, we detect 3580 C IV absorption systems with z_{abs} = 1.5188 ~ 3.5212, and 1809 Mg II absorption systems with z_{abs} = 0.3948 ~ 1.7167. In term of the absorber velocity (beta) distribution at quasar rest frame, we find a substantial number of C IV absorbers with beta<0.06, which might be connected to the absorptions of quasar outflows. The outflow absorptions peak at v~2000 km/s and drop rapidly below the peak value. Among 3580 C IV absorption systems, 52 systems (~ 1.5%) show obvious variations in equivalent widths at the absorber rest frame (Wr): 16 enhanced, 16 emerged, 12 weaken, and 8 disappeared systems, respectively. We find that changes in Wr548 are neither related to time-scales of the two SDSS observations, nor to absorber velocities at the quasar rest frame. Variable absorptions in low-ionization species are important to constraint the physical conditions of absorbing gas. There are two variable Mg II absorption systems measured from SDSS spectra detected by Hacker et al. However, in our Mg II$ absorption sample, we find that neither shows variable absorption with confident levels of >4sigma for lambda2796 lines and >3sigma for lambda2803 lines.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2013

Population synthesis on high-mass X-ray binaries: prospects and constraints from the universal X-ray luminosity function

Using an updated population synthesis code initially developed by Hurley et al. we modeled the synthetic X-ray binary (XRB) populations for direct comparison with the universal, featureless X-ray luminosity function (XLF) of high mass X-ray binaries (HMXBs) in star-forming galaxies. Our main goal is to use the universal XLF to constrain the model parameters, given the current knowledge of binary evolution. We find that the one-dimensional (1D) Maxwellian velocity dispersion of the natal kick can be constrained to be of the order of ~150km/s, supporting earlier findings that neutron stars (NSs) formed in binaries seem to receive significantly smaller natal kicks than the velocities of Galactic single pulsars would indicate. The super-Eddington accretion factor is further confirmed in the framework of stellar mass black holes (BHs), revealing the true origin of the most of the ultraluminous X-ray sources (ULXs) may indeed be the high-luminosity extension of ordinary HMXBs which harbor stellar-mass BHs rather than exotic intermediate-mass BHs or ones. We present the detail properties of the model-predicted present-day HMXBs, which may be investigated by future high-resolution X-ray and optical observations of sources in nearby star-forming galaxies.

astro-ph.HE↗

arXiv2013

Turbulence in the Inter-galactic Medium: Solenoidal and Dilatational Motions, and the Impact of Numerical Viscosity

We use a suite of cosmological hydrodynamic simulations, run by two fixed grid codes, to investigate the properties of solenoidal and dilatational motions of the intergalactic medium (IGM), and the impact of numerical viscosity on turbulence in a LCDM universe. The codes differ only in the spatial difference discretization. We find that (1) The vortical motion grows rapidly since $z=2$, and reaches $\sim 10 km/s -90 km/s$ at $z=0$. Meanwhile, the small-scale compressive ratio $r_{CS}$ drops from 0.84 to 0.47, indicating comparable vortical and compressive motions at present. (2) Power spectra of the solenoidal velocity possess two regimes, $\propto k^{-0.89}$ and $\propto k^{-2.02}$, while the total and dilatational velocity follow the scaling $k^{-1.88}$ and $k^{-2.20}$ respectively in the turbulent range. The IGM turbulence may contain two distinct phases, the supersonic and post-supersonic phases. (3) The non-thermal pressure support, measured by the vortical kinetic energy, is comparable with the thermal pressure for $ρ_b \simeq 10-100$, or $T <10^{5.5} K$ at $z=0.0$. The deviation of the baryon fraction from the cosmic mean shows a preliminary positive correlation with the turbulence pressure support. (4) A relatively higher numerical viscosity would dissipate both the compressive and vortical motions of the IGM into thermal energy more effectively, resulting in less developed vorticity, remarkably shortened inertial range, and leading to non-negligible uncertainty in the thermal history of gas accretion. Shocks in regions outside of clusters are significantly suppressed by numerical viscosity since $z=2$, which may directly cause the different levels of turbulence between two codes.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2012

CANDELS: Correlations of SEDs and Morphologies with Star-formation Status for Massive Galaxies at z ~ 2

We present a study on Spectral Energy Distributions, Morphologies, and star formation for an IRAC-selected extremely red object sample in the GOODS Chandra Deep Field-South. This work was enabled by new HST/WFC3 near-IR imaging from the CANDELS survey as well as the deepest available X-ray data from Chandra 4 Ms observations. This sample consists of 133 objects with the 3.6um limiting magnitude of [3.6] = 21.5, and is approximately complete for galaxies with M >10^{11}M_sun at 1.5 < z < 2.5. We classify this sample into two types, quiescent and star-forming galaxies, in the observed infrared color-color ([3.6]-[24] vs K-[3.6]) diagram. The further morphological study of this sample show a consistent result with the observed color classification. The classified quiescent galaxies are bulge dominated and star-forming galaxies in the sample have disk or irregular morphologies. Our observed infrared color classification is also consistent with the rest-frame color (U-V vs V-J) classification. We also found that quiescent and star-forming galaxies are well separated in the nonparametric morphology parameter (Gini vs M_{20}) diagram measuring their concentration and clumpiness: quiescent galaxies have Gini coefficient higher than 0.58 and star forming galaxies have Gini coefficient lower that 0.58. We argue that the star formation quenching process must lead to or be accompanied by the increasing galaxy concentration. One prominent morphological feature of this sample is that disks are commonly seen in this massive galaxy sample at 1.5 < z < 2.5: 30% of quiescent galaxies and 70% of star forming galaxies with M >10^{11}M_sun have disks in their rest-frame optical morphologies. The prevalence of these extended, relatively undisturbed disks challenges the merging scenario as the main mode of massive galaxy formation.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2011

Serendipitous Discovery of Warm Absorbers in the Seyfert 2 Galaxy IRAS 18325-5926

Warm absorption is a common phenomenon in Seyfert 1s and quasars, but rare in Seyfert 2s. In this paper, we report the detection of warm absorbers with high energy resolution in the Seyfert 2 galaxy IRAS 18325-5926 for the first time with Chandra HETGS spectra. An intrinsic absorbing line system with an outflow velocity ~400 km/s was found, which is contributed by two warm absorbers with FWHM of 570 km/s and 1360 km/s, respectively. The two absorbers were adjacent, and doing a transverse motion across our line of sight. We constrained the distance of the absorbers to a small value, suggesting that the absorbers may originate from the highly ionized accretion disk wind. The perspective of this type 2 Seyfert provides the best situation to investigate the vertical part of the funnel-like outflows. Another weak absorbing line system with zero redshift was also detected, which could be due to Galactic absorption with very high temperature, or an intrinsic outflow with very high velocity ~6000 km/s.

astro-ph.CO↗