Document Type
Article
Publication Date
11-3-2022
Department
Physics and Astronomy
Abstract
Galaxies broadly fall into two categories: star-forming (blue) galaxies and quiescent (red) galaxies. In between, one finds the less populated “green valley". Some of these galaxies are suspected to be in the process of ceasing their star-formation through a gradual exhaustion of gas supply or already dead and are experiencing a rejuvenation of star-formation through fuel injection. We use the Galaxy And Mass Assembly database and the Galaxy Zoo citizen science morphological estimates to compare the morphology of galaxies in the green valley against those in the red sequence and blue cloud. Our goal is to examine the structural differences within galaxies that fall in the green valley, and what brings them there. Previous results found disc features such as rings and lenses are more prominently represented in the green valley population. We revisit this with a similar sized data set of galaxies with morphology labels provided by the Galaxy Zoo for the GAMA fields based on new KiDS images. Our aim is to compare qualitatively the results from expert classification to that of citizen science. We observe that ring structures are indeed found more commonly in green valley galaxies compared to their red and blue counterparts. We suggest that ring structures are a consequence of disc galaxies in the green valley actively exhibiting characteristics of fading discs and evolving disc morphology of galaxies. We note that the progression from blue to red correlates with loosening spiral arm structure.
Original Publication Information
Dominic Smith, Lutz Haberzettl, L E Porter, Ren Porter-Temple, Christopher P A Henry, Benne Holwerda, Á R López-Sánchez, Steven Phillipps, Alister W Graham, Sarah Brough, Kevin A Pimbblet, Jochen Liske, Lee S Kelvin, Clayton D Robertson, Wade Roemer, Michael Walmsley, David O’Ryan, Tobias Géron, Galaxy And Mass Assembly: galaxy morphology in the green valley, prominent rings, and looser spiral arms, Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Volume 517, Issue 3, December 2022, Pages 4575–4589, https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stac2258
ThinkIR Citation
Smith, Dominic; Haberzettl, Lutz; Porter, L E.; Porter-Temple, Ren; Henry, Christopher P A; Holwerda, Benne; López-Sánchez, Á R.; Phillipps, Steven; Graham, Alister W.; Brough, Sarah; Pimbblet, Kevin A.; Liske, Jochen; Kelvin, Lee S.; Robertson, Clayton D.; Roemer, Wade; Walmsley, Michael; O’Ryan, David; and Géron, Tobias, "Galaxy And Mass Assembly: galaxy morphology in the green valley, prominent rings, and looser spiral arms" (2022). Faculty Scholarship. 857.
https://ir.library.louisville.edu/faculty/857
DOI
10.1093/mnras/stac2258
ORCID
0000-0002-4884-6756
Comments
© 2022 The Author(s) Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Royal Astronomical Society.