arXiv subjects

V. Kalinova

Publications and source records attributed to V. Kalinova.

17 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2025

The EDGE-CALIFA survey: The effect of active galactic nucleus feedback on the integrated properties of galaxies at different stages of their evolution

Galaxy quenching, the intricate process through which galaxies transition from active star-forming states to retired ones, remains a complex phenomenon that requires further investigation. This study investigates the role of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) in regulating star formation by analyzing a sample of 643 nearby galaxies with redshifts between 0.005 and 0.03 from the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field Area (CALIFA) survey. Galaxies were classified according to the Quenching Stages and Nuclear Activity (QueStNA) scheme, which categorizes them based on their quenching stage and the presence of nuclear activity. We further utilized the integrated Extragalactic Database for Galaxy Evolution (iEDGE), which combined homogenized optical integral field unit and CO observations. This allowed us to examine how AGNs influence the molecular gas reservoirs of active galaxies compared to their non-active counterparts at similar evolutionary stages. Our Kolmogorov-Smirnov and chi-squared tests indicate that the star formation property distributions and scaling relations of AGN hosts are largely consistent with those of non-active galaxies. However, AGN hosts exhibit systematically higher molecular gas masses across all quenching stages except for the quiescent nuclear ring stage. We find that AGN hosts follow the expected trends of non-active quenching galaxies, characterized by a lower star formation efficiency and molecular gas fraction compared to star-forming galaxies. Our results suggest that signatures of instantaneous AGN feedback are not prominent in the global molecular gas and star formation properties of galaxies.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2025

The EDGE-CALIFA Survey: An integral field unit-based integrated molecular gas database for galaxy evolution studies in the Local Universe

Studying galaxy evolution requires knowledge not only of the stellar properties, but also of the interstellar medium (in particular the molecular phase) out of which stars form, using a statistically significant and unbiased sample of galaxies. To this end, we introduce here the integrated Extragalactic Database for Galaxy Evolution (iEDGE), a collection of integrated stellar and nebular emission lines, and molecular gas properties from 643 galaxies in the local Universe. These galaxies are drawn from the CALIFA datasets, and are followed up in CO lines by the APEX, CARMA, and ACA telescopes. As this database is assembled from data coming from a heterogeneous set of telescopes (including IFU optical data and single-dish and interferometric CO data), we adopted a series of techniques (tapering, spatial and spectral smoothing, and aperture correction) to homogenise the data. Due to the application of these techniques, the database contains measurements from the inner regions of the galaxies and for the full galaxy extent. We used the database to study the fundamental star formation relationships between star formation rate (SFR), stellar mass ($M_*$), and molecular gas mass ($M_{\rm mol}$) across galaxies with different morphologies. We observed that the diagrams defined by these quantities are bi-modal, with early-type passive objects well separated from spiral star-forming galaxies. Additionally, while the molecular gas fraction ($f_{\rm mol}=M_{\rm mol}/M_*$) decreases homogeneously across these two types of galaxies, the star formation efficiency (SFE=SFR/$M_{\rm mol}$) in the inner regions of passive galaxies is almost two orders of magnitude lower compared to the global values. This indicates that inside-out quenching requires not only low $f_{\rm mol}$, but also strongly reduced SFE in the galactic centres.

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arXiv2025

The EDGE-CALIFA survey: Star formation relationships for galaxies at different stages of their evolution

Galaxy evolution is largely driven by star formation activity or by the cessation of it, also called star formation quenching. In this paper, we present star formation scaling relations for galaxies at different evolutionary stages. To do so, we used the integrated Extragalactic Database for Galaxy Evolution (iEDGE), which collects CO, optical continuum, and emission line information for 643 galaxies from the CALIFA IFU dataset. By considering the patterns described by star-forming and retired regions, we grouped the galaxies into quenching stages using the emission line classification scheme, QueStNA. We observed that the molecular gas mass ($M_{\rm mol}$) decreases from star-forming to retired systems and so does the molecular-to-stellar mass ratio ($f_{\rm mol}$). In contrast, star formation efficiency (SFE) is constant in the quenching stages dominated by star formation and rapidly declines afterwards. We observed that this rapid decline is more pronounced in the centre of the galaxies compared to the rest of the discs, reflecting the inside-out quenching displayed by nearby galaxies. We noticed that the relations between $M_{\rm mol}$ and the stellar mass ($M_*$) become increasingly shallow with the quenching stages; however, the relations between the star formation rate (SFR) and $M_{\rm mol}$ steepen when going from star-forming to retired systems. We observed that a three-dimensional relation between SFR, $M_*$, and $M_{\rm mol}$ exists for star-forming galaxies, while data points from other quenching groups are scattered across the parameter space. Taken together, these pieces of evidence indicate that the quenching of the galaxies cannot be explained solely by a depletion of the molecular gas and that a significant decrease in the SFE is necessary to retire the centre of the galaxies beyond the star formation green valley.

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arXiv2022

Investigating the link between inner gravitational potential and star-formation quenching in CALIFA galaxies

It has been suggested that the gravitational potential can have a significant role in suppressing the star formation in the nearby galaxies. To establish observational constrains on this scenario, we investigate the connection between the dynamics, through the circular velocity curves (CVCs) as a proxy of the inner gravitational potential, and star formation quenching in 215 non-active galaxies across Hubble sequence from the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field Area (CALIFA) survey. Our results show that galaxies with similar CVCs tend to have a certain star-formation quenching pattern. To explore these findings in more details, we construct kpc-resolved relations of the equivalent width of the H$α$ ($W_{{\rm H}α}$) versus the amplitude ($V_c$) and shape ($β= d\ln V_c/ d\ln R$) of the circular velocity at given radius. We find that the $W_{{\rm H}α}-V_c$ is a declining relationship, where the retired regions of the galaxies (the ones with $W_{{\rm H}α}$ values below 3 Å) tend to have higher $V_c$. Differently, $W_{{\rm H}α}-β$ is a bi-modal relationship, characterised by two peaks: concentration of the star forming regions at a positive $β$ (rising CVC) and another one of the retired regions with a negative $β$ (declining CVC). Our results show that both the amplitude of the CVC, driven by the mass of the galaxies, and the shape of the CVC, reflecting the internal structure of the galaxies, play an important role in galaxy's quenching history.

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arXiv2021

The EDGE-CALIFA survey: The resolved star formation efficiency and local physical conditions

We measure the star formation rate (SFR) per unit gas mass and the star formation efficiency (SFE$_{\rm gas}$ for total gas, SFE$_{\rm mol}$ for the molecular gas) in 81 nearby galaxies selected from the EDGE-CALIFA survey, using $^{12}$CO(J=1-0) and optical IFU data. For this analysis we stack CO spectra coherently by using the velocities of H$α$ detections to detect fainter CO emission out to galactocentric radii $r_{\rm gal} \sim 1.2 r_{25}$ ($\sim 3 R_{\rm e}$), and include the effects of metallicity and high surface densities in the CO-to-H$_2$ conversion. We determine the scale lengths for the molecular and stellar components, finding a close to 1:1 relation between them. This result indicates that CO emission and star formation activity are closely related. We examine the radial dependence of SFE$_{\rm gas}$ on physical parameters such as galactocentric radius, stellar surface density $Σ_{\star}$, dynamical equilibrium pressure $P_{\rm DE}$, orbital timescale $τ_{\rm orb}$, and the Toomre $Q$ stability parameter (including star and gas $Q_{\rm star+gas}$). We observe a generally smooth, continuous exponential decline in the SFE$_{\rm gas}$ with $r_{\rm gal}$. The SFE$_{\rm gas}$ dependence on most of the physical quantities appears to be well described by a power-law. Our results also show a flattening in the SFE$_{\rm gas}$-$τ_{\rm orb}$ relation at $\log[τ_{\rm orb}]\sim 7.9-8.1$ and a morphological dependence of the SFE$_{\rm gas}$ per orbital time, which may reflect star formation quenching due to the presence of a bulge component. We do not find a clear correlation between SFE$_{\rm gas}$ and $Q_{\rm star+gas}$.

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arXiv2021

The EDGE-CALIFA survey: The local and global relations between $Σ_\ast$ , $Σ_{SFR}$ and $Σ_{mol}$ that regulate star-formation

We present a new characterization of the relations between star-formation rate, stellar mass and molecular gas mass surface densities at different spatial scales across galaxies (from galaxy wide to kpc-scales). To do so we make use of the largest sample combining spatially-resolved spectroscopic information with CO observations, provided by the EDGE-CALIFA survey, together with new single dish CO observations obtained by APEX. We show that those relations are the same at the different explored scales, sharing the same distributions for the explored data, with similar slope, intercept and scatter (when characterized by a simple power-law). From this analysis, we propose that these relations are the projection of a single relation between the three properties that follows a distribution well described by a line in the three-dimension parameter space. Finally, we show that observed secondary relations between the residuals and the considered parameters are fully explained by the correlation between the uncertainties, and therefore have no physical origin. We discuss these results in the context of the hypothesis of self-regulation of the star-formation process.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2021

Star formation quenching stages of active and non-active galaxies

The mechanisms that bring galaxies to strongly reduce their star formation activity (star-formation quenching) is still poorly understood. To better study galaxy evolution, we propose a classification based on the maps of the ionised hydrogen distribution, traced by kpc-resolved, equivalent width of H$α$ maps, and the nuclear activity of the galaxies using information from the BPT diagnostic diagrams. Using these tools, we group a sample of 238 galaxies from the CALIFA survey in six quenching stages (QS): objects dominated by recent star formation; systems that present a quiescent-nuclear-ring structure in their centre; galaxies that are centrally-quiescent; galaxies with no clear pattern in their ionisation gas distribution - mixed; systems that posses only a few star-forming regions - nearly-retired, or galaxies that are completely quiescent - fully-retired. Regarding their nuclear activity, we further divide the galaxies into two groups - active systems that host a weak or strong AGN in their centre, and non-active objects. Galaxies grouped into quenching stage classes occupy specific locations on the star-formation-rate versus stellar mass diagram. The "Blue cloud" is populated by the star-forming and the quiescent-nuclear-ring galaxies, the "Green valley" is populated by centrally-quiescent and mixed systems, "Red sequence" by the nearly- and fully-retired objects. Generally, galaxies that host a weak or strong AGN show properties, comparable to the non-active counterparts at the same quenching stages, except for the AGN-hosting star-forming systems. The degree of the star-formation quenching increases along the present emission-line pattern sequence from star-forming to fully-retired. The proposed emission-line classes reinforce the "inside-out" quenching scenario, which foresees that the suppression of the star-formation begins from the central regions of the galaxies.

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arXiv2020

The EDGE-CALIFA survey: exploring the role of the molecular gas on the galaxy star formation quenching

Understanding how galaxies cease to form stars represents an outstanding challenge for galaxy evolution theories. This process of "star formation quenching" has been related to various causes, including Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) activity, the influence of large-scale dynamics, and the environment in which galaxies live. In this paper, we present the first results from a follow-up of CALIFA survey galaxies with observations of molecular gas obtained with the APEX telescope. Together with EDGE survey CARMA observations, we collect $^{12}$CO observations that cover approximately one effective radius in 472 CALIFA galaxies. We observe that the deficit of galaxy star formation with respect to the star formation main sequence (SFMS) increases with the absence of molecular gas and with a reduced efficiency of conversion of molecular gas into stars, in line with results of other integrated studies. However, by dividing the sample into galaxies dominated by star formation and galaxies quenched in their centres (as indicated by the average value of the H$α$ equivalent width), we find that this deficit increases sharply once a certain level of gas consumption is reached, indicating that different mechanisms drive separation from the SFMS in star-forming and quenched galaxies. Our results indicate that differences in the amount of molecular gas at a fixed stellar mass are the primary driver for the dispersion in the SFMS, and the most likely explanation for the start of star-formation quenching. However, once a galaxy is quenched, changes in star formation efficiency drive how much a retired galaxy separates in star formation rate from star-forming ones of similar masses. In other words, once a paucity of molecular gas has significantly reduced star formation, changes in the star formation efficiency are what drives a galaxy deeper into the red cloud, retiring it.

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arXiv2017

The EDGE-CALIFA survey: the influence of galactic rotation on the molecular depletion time across the Hubble sequence

We present a kpc-scale analysis of the relationship between the molecular depletion time ($τ_\mathrm{dep}^\mathrm{mol}$) and the orbital time ($τ_\mathrm{orb}$) across the field of 39 face-on local galaxies, selected from the EDGE-CALIFA sample. We find that, on average, 5% of the available molecular gas is converted into stars per orbital time, or $τ_\mathrm{dep}^\mathrm{mol}\sim20τ_\mathrm{orb}$. The resolved relation shows a scatter of $\sim0.5$ dex. The scatter is ascribable to galaxies of different morphologies that follow different $τ_\mathrm{dep}^\mathrm{mol}-τ_\mathrm{orb}$ relations which decrease in steepness from early- to late-types. The morphologies appear to be linked with the star formation rate surface density, the molecular depletion time, and the orbital time, but they do not correlate with the molecular gas content of the galaxies in our sample. We speculate that in our molecular gas rich, early-type galaxies, the morphological quenching (in particular the disc stabilization via shear), rather than the absence of molecular gas, is the main factor responsible for their current inefficient star formation.

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arXiv2015

Outer-disk reddening and gas-phase metallicities: The CALIFA connection

We study, for the first time in a statistically significant and well-defined sample, the relation between the outer-disk ionized-gas metallicity gradients and the presence of breaks in the surface brightness profiles of disk galaxies. SDSS g'- and r'-band surface brightness, (g'- r') color, and ionized-gas oxygen abundance profiles for 324 galaxies within the CALIFA survey are used for this purpose. We perform a detailed light-profile classification finding that 84% of our disks show down- or up-bending profiles (Type II and Type III, respectively) while the remaining 16% are well fitted by one single exponential (Type I). The analysis of the color gradients at both sides of this break shows a U-shaped profile for most Type II galaxies with an average minimum (g'- r') color of ~0.5 mag and a ionized-gas metallicity flattening associated to it only in the case of low-mass galaxies. More massive systems show a rather uniform negative metallicity gradient. The correlation between metallicity flattening and stellar mass results in p-values as low as 0.01. Independently of the mechanism having shaped the outer light profiles of these galaxies, stellar migration or a previous episode of star formation in a shrinking star-forming disk, it is clear that the imprint in their ionized-gas metallicity was different for low- and high-mass Type II galaxies. In the case of Type III disks, a positive correlation between the change in color and abundance gradient is found (the null hypothesis is ruled out with a p-value of 0.02), with the outer disks of Type III galaxies with masses $\leq$10$^{10}$ M$_{\odot}$ showing a weak color reddening or even a bluing. This is interpreted as primarily due to a mass down-sizing effect on the population of Type III galaxies having recently experienced an enhanced inside-out growth.

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arXiv2015

The CALIFA survey across the Hubble sequence: Spatially resolved stellar population properties in galaxies

This paper characterizes the radial structure of stellar population properties of galaxies in the nearby universe, based on 300 galaxies from the CALIFA survey. The sample covers a wide range of Hubble types, and galaxy stellar mass. We apply the spectral synthesis techniques to recover the stellar mass surface density, stellar extinction, light and mass-weighted ages, and mass-weighted metallicity, for each spatial resolution element in our target galaxies. To study mean trends with overall galaxy properties, the individual radial profiles are stacked in seven bins of galaxy morphology. We confirm that more massive galaxies are more compact, older, more metal rich, and less reddened by dust. Additionally, we find that these trends are preserved spatially with the radial distance to the nucleus. Deviations from these relations appear correlated with Hubble type: earlier types are more compact, older, and more metal rich for a given mass, which evidences that quenching is related to morphology, but not driven by mass. Negative gradients of ages are consistent with an inside-out growth of galaxies, with the largest ages gradients in Sb-Sbc galaxies. Further, the mean stellar ages of disks and bulges are correlated, with disks covering a wider range of ages, and late type spirals hosting younger disks. The gradients in stellar mass surface density depend mostly on stellar mass, in the sense that more massive galaxies are more centrally concentrated. There is a secondary correlation in the sense that at the same mass early type galaxies have steeper gradients. We find mildly negative metallicity gradients, shallower than predicted from models of galaxy evolution in isolation. The largest gradients occur in Sb galaxies. Overall we conclude that quenching processes act in manners that are independent of mass, while metallicity and galaxy structure are influenced by mass-dependent processes.

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arXiv2015

The incidence of bar-like kinematic flows in CALIFA galaxies

We carry out a direct search for bar-like non-circular flows in intermediate-inclination, gas-rich disk galaxies with a range of morphological types and photometric bar classifications from the first data release (DR1) of the CALIFA survey. We use the DiskFit algorithm to apply rotation only and bisymmetric flow models to H$α$ velocity fields for 49/100 CALIFA DR1 systems that meet our selection criteria. We find satisfactory fits for a final sample of 37 systems. DiskFit is sensitive to the radial or tangential components of a bar-like flow with amplitudes greater than $15\,$km$\,$s$^{-1}$ across at least two independent radial bins in the fit, or ~2.25 kpc at the characteristic final sample distance of ~75 Mpc. The velocity fields of 25/37 $(67.6^{+6.6}_{-8.5}\%)$ galaxies are best characterized by pure rotation, although only 17/25 $(68.0^{+7.7}_{-10.4}\%)$ of them have sufficient H$α$ emission near the galaxy centre to afford a search for non-circular flows. We detect non-circular flows in the remaining 12/37 $(32.4^{+8.5}_{-6.6}\%)$ galaxies. We conclude that the non-circular flows detected in 11/12 $(91.7^{+2.8}_{-14.9}\%)$ systems stem from bars. Galaxies with intermediate (AB) bars are largely undetected, and our detection thresholds therefore represent upper limits to the amplitude of the non-circular flows therein. We find 2/23 $(8.7^{+9.6}_{-2.9}\%)$ galaxies that show non-circular motions consistent with a bar-like flow, yet no photometric bar is evident. This suggests that in ~10% of galaxies either the existence of a bar may be missed completely in photometry or other processes may drive bar-like flows and thus secular galaxy evolution.

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arXiv2015

Bar pattern speeds in CALIFA galaxies: I. Fast bars across the Hubble sequence

The bar pattern speed ($Ω_{\rm b}$) is defined as the rotational frequency of the bar, and it determines the bar dynamics. Several methods have been proposed for measuring $Ω_{\rm b}$. The non-parametric method proposed by Tremaine \& Weinberg (1984; TW) and based on stellar kinematics is the most accurate. This method has been applied so far to 17 galaxies, most of them SB0 and SBa types. We have applied the TW method to a new sample of 15 strong and bright barred galaxies, spanning a wide range of morphological types from SB0 to SBbc. Combining our analysis with previous studies, we investigate 32 barred galaxies with their pattern speed measured by the TW method. The resulting total sample of barred galaxies allows us to study the dependence of $Ω_{\rm b}$ on galaxy properties, such as the Hubble type. We measured $Ω_{\rm b}$ using the TW method on the stellar velocity maps provided by the integral-field spectroscopy data from the CALIFA survey. Integral-field data solve the problems that long-slit data present when applying the TW method, resulting in the determination of more accurate $Ω_{\rm b}$. In addition, we have also derived the ratio $\cal{R}$ of the corotation radius to the bar length of the galaxies. According to this parameter, bars can be classified as fast ($\cal{R}$ $< 1.4$) and slow ($\cal{R}$>1.4). For all the galaxies, $\cal{R}$ is compatible within the errors with fast bars. We cannot rule out (at 95$\%$ level) the fast bar solution for any galaxy. We have not observed any significant trend between $\cal{R}$ and the galaxy morphological type. Our results indicate that independent of the Hubble type, bars have been formed and then evolve as fast rotators. This observational result will constrain the scenarios of formation and evolution of bars proposed by numerical simulations.

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arXiv2014

CALIFA, the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field Area survey. III. Second public data release

This paper describes the Second Public Data Release (DR2) of the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field Area (CALIFA) survey. The data for 200 objects are made public, including the 100 galaxies of the First Public Data Release (DR1). Data were obtained with the integral-field spectrograph PMAS/PPak mounted on the 3.5 m telescope at the Calar Alto observatory. Two different spectral setups are available for each galaxy, (i) a low-resolution V500 setup covering the wavelength range 3745-7500 Å with a spectral resolution of 6.0 Å (FWHM), and (ii) a medium-resolution V1200 setup covering the wavelength range 3650-4840 Å with a spectral resolution of 2.3 Å (FWHM). The sample covers a redshift range between 0.005 and 0.03, with a wide range of properties in the Color-Magnitude diagram, stellar mass, ionization conditions, and morphological types. All released cubes were reduced with the latest pipeline, including improved spectrophotometric calibration, spatial registration and spatial resolution. The spectrophotometric calibration is better than 6% and the median spatial resolution is 2.5". Altogether the second data release contains over 1.5 million spectra. It is available at http://califa.caha.es/DR2.

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arXiv2014

CALIFA: a diameter-selected sample for an integral field spectroscopy galaxy survey

We describe and discuss the selection procedure and statistical properties of the galaxy sample used by the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field Area Survey (CALIFA), a public legacy survey of 600 galaxies using integral field spectroscopy. The CALIFA "mother sample" was selected from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) DR7 photometric catalogue to include all galaxies with an r-band isophotal major axis between 45" and 79.2" and with a redshift 0.005 < z < 0.03. The mother sample contains 939 objects, 600 of which will be observed in the course of the CALIFA survey. The selection of targets for observations is based solely on visibility and thus keeps the statistical properties of the mother sample. By comparison with a large set of SDSS galaxies, we find that the CALIFA sample is representative of galaxies over a luminosity range of -19 > Mr > -23.1 and over a stellar mass range between 10^9.7 and 10^11.4Msun. In particular, within these ranges, the diameter selection does not lead to any significant bias against - or in favour of - intrinsically large or small galaxies. Only below luminosities of Mr = -19 (or stellar masses < 10^9.7Msun) is there a prevalence of galaxies with larger isophotal sizes, especially of nearly edge-on late-type galaxies, but such galaxies form < 10% of the full sample. We estimate volume-corrected distribution functions in luminosities and sizes and show that these are statistically fully compatible with estimates from the full SDSS when accounting for large-scale structure. We also present a number of value-added quantities determined for the galaxies in the CALIFA sample. We explore different ways of characterizing the environments of CALIFA galaxies, finding that the sample covers environmental conditions from the field to genuine clusters. We finally consider the expected incidence of active galactic nuclei among CALIFA galaxies.

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arXiv2013

CALIFA, the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field Area survey. II. First public data release

We present the first public data release of the CALIFA survey. It consists of science-grade optical datacubes for the first 100 of eventually 600 nearby (0.005<z<0.03) galaxies, obtained with the integral-field spectrograph PMAS/PPak mounted on the 3.5m telescope at the Calar Alto observatory. The galaxies in DR1 already cover a wide range of properties in color-magnitude space, morphological type, stellar mass, and gas ionization conditions. This offers the potential to tackle a variety of open questions in galaxy evolution using spatially resolved spectroscopy. Two different spectral setups are available for each galaxy, (i) a low-resolution V500 setup covering the nominal wavelength range 3745-7500A with a spectral resolution of 6.0A (FWHM), and (ii) a medium-resolution V1200 setup covering the nominal wavelength range 3650-4840A with a spectral resolution of 2.3A (FWHM). We present the characteristics and data structure of the CALIFA datasets that should be taken into account for scientific exploitation of the data, in particular the effects of vignetting, bad pixels and spatially correlated noise. The data quality test for all 100 galaxies showed that we reach a median limiting continuum sensitivity of 1.0x10^-18erg/s/cm^2/A/arcsec^2 at 5635A and 2.2x10^-18erg/s/cm^2/A/arcsec^2 at 4500A for the V500 and V1200 setup respectively, which corresponds to limiting r and g band surface brightnesses of 23.6mag/arcsec^2 and 23.4mag/arcsec^2, or an unresolved emission-line flux detection limit of roughly 1x10^-17erg/s/cm^2/arcsec^2 and 0.6x10^-17erg/s/cm^2/arcsec^2, respectively. The median spatial resolution is 3.7", and the absolute spectrophotometric calibration is better than 15% (1sigma). We also describe the available interfaces and tools that allow easy access to this first public CALIFA data.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2011

CALIFA, the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field Area survey: I. Survey presentation

We present here the Calar Alto Legacy Integral Field Area (CALIFA) survey, which has been designed to provide a first step in this direction.We summarize the survey goals and design, including sample selection and observational strategy.We also showcase the data taken during the first observing runs (June/July 2010) and outline the reduction pipeline, quality control schemes and general characteristics of the reduced data. This survey is obtaining spatially resolved spectroscopic information of a diameter selected sample of $\sim600$ galaxies in the Local Universe (0.005< z <0.03). CALIFA has been designed to allow the building of two-dimensional maps of the following quantities: (a) stellar populations: ages and metallicities; (b) ionized gas: distribution, excitation mechanism and chemical abundances; and (c) kinematic properties: both from stellar and ionized gas components. CALIFA uses the PPAK Integral Field Unit (IFU), with a hexagonal field-of-view of $\sim1.3\sq\arcmin'$, with a 100% covering factor by adopting a three-pointing dithering scheme. The optical wavelength range is covered from 3700 to 7000 Å, using two overlapping setups (V500 and V1200), with different resolutions: R\sim850 and R\sim1650, respectively. CALIFA is a legacy survey, intended for the community. The reduced data will be released, once the quality has been guaranteed. The analyzed data fulfill the expectations of the original observing proposal, on the basis of a set of quality checks and exploratory analysis. We conclude from this first look at the data that CALIFA will be an important resource for archaeological studies of galaxies in the Local Universe.

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