Galaxy formation and evolution

Abstract:

NGC 5128 (also known as Centaurus A) is the most nearby powerful AGN, widely studied at all wavelengths. Molecular gas has been found in the halo at a distance of ~ 20 kpc from the galaxy center, associated with H I shells, through CO line detection at SEST (Charmandaris et al. 2000, A&A, 356, L1). The molecular gas lies inside some IR and UV bright star-forming filaments that have recently been observed in the direction of the radio jets. These archival data from GALEX (FUV) and Herschel (IR) show that there is dust and very weak star formation (a few 10-5−10-4M⊙ yr-1) on scales of hundreds of parsecs. NGC 5128 is thus a perfect target for detailed studies of the star formation processes at the interface of the jet/gas interaction. On top of analysing combined archival data, we have performed searches of HCN(1–0) and HCO+(1–0) emission with ATCA at the interaction of the northern filaments and the northern H I shell of Centaurus A. Measuring the dense gas is another indicator of star formation efficiency inside the filaments. However, we only derived upper limits L′HCN < 1.6×103 K km s-1 pc2 and L′HCO < 1.6×103 K km s-1 pc2 at 3σ in the synthesised beam of 3.1′′. Compared with the CO luminosity, this lead to a dense-to-molecular gas fraction < 23%. We also compared the CO masses with the star formation rate estimates in order to measure a star formation efficiency. Using a standard conversion factor leads to long depletion times (7 Gyr). We then corrected the mass estimates from metallicity effect by using gas-to-dust mass ratio as a proxy. From MUSE data, we estimated the metallicity spread (0.4−0.8Z⊙) in an other region of the filament, that corresponds to gas-to-dust ratios of ~200−400. Assuming the same metallicity range in the CO-detected part of the filament, the CO/H2 conversion ratio is corrected for low metallicity by a factor between 1.4 and 3.2. Such a low-metallicity correction leads to even more massive clouds with higher depletion times (16 Gyr). We finally present ALMA observations that detect 3 unresolved CO(2−1) clumps of size < 37 × 21 pc and masses around 104M⊙. The velocity width of the CO emission line is ~ 10 km s-1, leading to a rather high virial parameter. This is a hint of a turbulent gas probably powered by kinetic energy injection from the AGN jet/wind and leading to molecular gas reservoir not forming star efficiently. This work shows the importance of high resolution data analysis to bring a new light on the local processes of AGN/jet feedback likely negative (quenching star formation) in the case of Cen A filaments.

Abstract:

Measurement of the evolution of both active galactic nuclei (AGN) and star-formation in galaxies underpins our understanding of galaxy evolution over cosmic time. Radio continuum observations can provide key information on these two processes, in particular via the mechanical feedback produced by radio jets in AGN, and via an unbiased dust-independent measurement of star formation rates. In this paper, we determine radio luminosity functions at 325 MHz for a sample of AGN and star-forming galaxies by matching a 138 deg2 radio survey conducted with the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope, with optical imaging and redshifts from the Galaxy And Mass Assembly survey. We find that the radio luminosity function at 325 MHz for star-forming galaxies closely follows that measured at 1.4 GHz. By fitting the AGN radio luminosity function out to z = 0.5 as a double power law, and parametrizing the evolution as Φ ∝ (1 + z)k, we find evolution parameters of k = 0.92 ± 0.95 assuming pure density evolution and k = 2.13 ± 1.96 assuming pure luminosity evolution. We find that the Low Excitation Radio Galaxies are the dominant population in space density at lower luminosities. Comparing our 325 MHz observations with radio continuum imaging at 1.4 GHz, we determine separate radio luminosity functions for steep- and flat-spectrum AGN, and show that the beamed population of flat-spectrum sources in our sample can be shifted in number density and luminosity to coincide with the unbeamed population of steep-spectrum sources, as is expected in the orientation-based unification of AGN.

Abstract:

We consider what can be learnt about the processes of gas accretion and depletion from the kinematic misalignment between the cold/warm gas and stars in local early-type galaxies. Using simple analytic arguments and a toy model of the processes involved, we show that the lack of objects with counter-rotating gas reservoirs strongly constrains the relaxation, depletion and accretion time-scales of gas in early-type galaxies. Standard values of the accretion rate, star-formation efficiency and relaxation rate are not simultaneously consistent with the observed distribution of kinematic misalignments. To reproduce that distribution, both fast gas depletion (tdep ≲ 108 yr; e.g. more efficient star formation) and fast gas destruction (e.g. by active galactic nucleus feedback) can be invoked, but both also require a high rate of gas-rich mergers (>1 Gyr−1). Alternatively, the relaxation of misaligned material could happen over very long time-scales (≃100 dynamical times or ≈1–5 Gyr). We explore the various physical processes that could lead to fast gas depletion and/or slow gas relaxation, and discuss the prospects of using kinematic misalignments to probe gas-rich accretion processes in the era of large integral-field spectroscopic surveys.

Abstract:

We report on the discovery of a z = 1.58 mature cluster around the high-redshift radio galaxy 7C 1753+6311, first identified in the Clusters Around Radio-loud active galactic nuclei survey. Two-thirds of the excess galaxies within the central 1 Mpc lie on a red sequence with a color that is consistent with an average formation redshift of zf ~ 3. We show that 80 ± 6% of the red sequence galaxies in the cluster core are quiescent, while the remaining 20% are red due to dusty star formation. We demonstrate that the cluster has an enhanced quiescent galaxy fraction that is three times that of the control field. We also show that this enhancement is mass dependent: 91 ± 9% of the ${M}_{*}\gt {10}^{10.5}$M⊙ cluster galaxies are quiescent, compared to only 36 ± 2% of field galaxies, whereas the fraction of quiescent galaxies with lower masses is the same in the cluster and field environments. The presence of a dense core and a well-formed, quiescent red sequence suggest that this is a mature cluster. This means that distant radio galaxies do not solely reside in young, uncollapsed protoclusters, rather they can be found in clusters in a wide range of evolutionary states.