…
comment: The repository administrator has not yet configured an RDF license.
primary topic: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers

Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers
type: Article
abstract: Galaxy interactions are expected to play a crucial role in the build--up of stellar mass in any cold dark matter cosmology. Of particular interest are the mergers between systems of a comparable mass, as they are predicted to be one of the main modes of galaxy growth and have a crucial impact in the shaping of galaxy morphologies and dynamics. In this thesis I study two key aspects of the role that mergers play in galaxy evolution: a) What is the contribution of major galaxy interactions to the star formation history of the Universe at z < 1?, and b) How important are galaxy interactions for the build--up of the massive end of the red sequence? To answer the first question I use photometric redshifts, stellar masses and UV star formation rates from COMBO-17, 24 microns star formation rates from Spitzer and galaxy morphologies from two deep Hubble Space Telescope cosmological survey fields to study the enhancement in star formation activity as a function of galaxy separation. I apply robust statistical tools to find galaxies in close pairs, augmented with morphologically-selected very close pairs (unresolved in the ground-based photometry) and merger remnants from the Hubble Space Telescope imaging, finding that, on average, major galaxy interactions between galaxies more massive than 10^10 M_sun at 0.4<z<0.8 enhance the star formation activity by a factor of less than 2. I carry out detailed modeling of the methodology using a mock galaxy catalog from the Millenium Simulation, finding that in the regime applicable to this work the recovered enhancement in SF rate is accurate to better than 10%, smaller than the other sources of uncertainty. Accounting for the fraction of merging and interacting systems, I integrate the enhanced star formation to demonstrate that less than 10% of star formation activity is directly triggered by those interactions. To answer the second question I look for close pairs of galaxies on a sample drawn from the COSMOS and COMBO-17 galaxy su…
date: 2010
status: published
author list: authors
type: EPrint
type: DoctoralThesisEPrint
is part of: repository
has document: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
has document: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (Other)
subject: 520 Astronomie

Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
type: Document
has file: thesis2RobainaRapisarda.pdf
has part: thesis2RobainaRapisarda.pdf

Aday Robaina Rapisarda
type: Person
given name: Aday
family name: Robaina Rapisarda

Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (Other)
type: Document
is version of: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
is volatile version of: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
is index codes version of: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
has file: indexcodes.txt
has part: indexcodes.txt

Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (Other)
type: Document
is version of: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
is volatile version of: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
islightbox thumbnail version of: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
has file: lightbox.jpg
has part: lightbox.jpg

Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (Other)
type: Document
is version of: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
is volatile version of: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
ispreview thumbnail version of: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
has file: preview.jpg
has part: preview.jpg

Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (Other)
type: Document
is version of: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
is volatile version of: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
ismedium thumbnail version of: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
has file: medium.jpg
has part: medium.jpg

Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (Other)
type: Document
is version of: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
is volatile version of: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
issmall thumbnail version of: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers (PDF)
has file: small.jpg
has part: small.jpg

HTML Summary of #10688 Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers
format: text/html
primary topic: Eight Gigayears of Galaxy Mergers

520 Astronomie
type: Concept
preferred label: 520 Astronomy and allied sciences @en