English

Evolution of Gas Flows along the Starburst to Post-Starburst to Quiescent Galaxy Sequence

Astrophysics of Galaxies 2024-04-02 v2

Abstract

We measure velocity offsets in the NaI λλ5890,5896\lambda\lambda5890, 5896 (Na D) interstellar medium absorption lines to track how neutral galactic winds change as their host galaxies evolve. Our sample of \sim80,000 SDSS spectra at 0.010<z<0.3250.010 < z < 0.325 includes starburst, post-starburst, and quiescent galaxies, forming an evolutionary sequence of declining star formation rate (SFR). We detect bulk flows across this sequence, mostly at higher host stellar masses(log(M/M)>10log(M_{\star}/M_{\odot})>10). Along this sequence, the fraction of outflows decreases (76±2%76\pm2\% to 65±4%65\pm4\% to a 3σ\sigma upper limit of 34%34\%), and the mean velocity offset changes from outflowing to inflowing (84.6±5.9-84.6\pm5.9 to 71.6±11.4-71.6\pm11.4 to 76.6±2.3kms176.6\pm2.3\,km\,s^{-1}). Even within the post-starburst sample, wind speed decreases with time elapsed since the starburst ended. These results reveal that outflows diminish as galaxies age. For post-starbursts, there is evidence for an AGN contribution, especially to the speediest outflows: 1) SFR declines faster in time than outflow velocity, a decoupling arguing against massive stellar feedback; 2) of the few outflows strong enough to escape the interstellar medium (9/105), three of the four hosts with measured emission lines are Seyfert galaxies. For disky starburst galaxies, however, the trends suggest flows out of the stellar disk plane (with outflow 1/2-opening angle >45> 45 degree) instead of from the nucleus: the wind velocity decreases as the disk becomes more edge-on, and the outflow fraction, constant at \sim90%\% for disk inclinations i<45i<45 degree, steadily decreases from \sim90% to 20%\% for i>45i>45 degree.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2310.00424,
  title  = {Evolution of Gas Flows along the Starburst to Post-Starburst to Quiescent Galaxy Sequence},
  author = {Yang Sun and Gwang-Ho Lee and Ann I. Zabludoff and K. Decker French and Jakob M. Helton and Nicole A. Kerrison and Christy A. Tremonti and Yujin Yang},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2310.00424},
  year   = {2024}
}

Comments

22 pages, 19 figures, accepted for publication in MNRAS