We have carried out a survey for CO J=1-0 and J=2-1 emission in the 260 early-type galaxies of the volume-limited ATLAS3D sample, with the goal of connecting their star formation and assembly histories to their cold gas content. This is the largest volume-limited CO survey of its kind and is the first to include many Virgo cluster members. Sample members are dynamically hot galaxies with a median stellar mass ~3x10^10^M_{sun}_; they are selected by their morphology rather than colour, and the bulk of them lie on the red sequence. The overall CO detection rate is 56/259=0.22+/-0.03, with no dependence on the K luminosity and only a modest dependence on the dynamical mass. There are a dozen CO detections among the Virgo cluster members; statistical analysis of their H_2_ mass distributions and their dynamical status within the cluster shows that the cluster's influence on their molecular masses is subtle at best, even though (unlike spirals) they seem to be virialized within the cluster. We suggest that the cluster members have retained their molecular gas through several Gyr residences in the cluster.
In Paper I of this series we introduced a volume-limited parent sample of 871 galaxies from which we extracted the ATLAS3D sample of 260 early-type galaxies (ETGs). In Papers II and III we classified the ETGs using their stellar kinematics, in a way that is nearly insensitive to the projection effects, and we separated them into fast and slow rotators. Here we look at galaxy morphology and note that the edge-on fast rotators generally are lenticular galaxies.
We investigate nuclear light profiles in 135 ATLAS3D galaxies for which the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) imaging is available and compare them to the large-scale kinematics obtained with the SAURON integral-field spectrograph. Specific angular momentum, {lambda}_R_, correlates with the shape of nuclear light profiles, where, as suggested by previous studies, cores are typically found in slow rotators and core-less galaxies are fast rotators. As also shown before, cores are found only in massive galaxies and only in systems with the stellar mass (measured via dynamical models) M>~8x10^10^M_{sun}_. Based on our sample, we, however, see no evidence for a bimodal distribution of nuclear slopes. The best predictor for finding a core is based on the stellar velocity dispersion within an effective radius, {sigma}_e_, and specific angular momentum, where cores are found for {lambda}_R<~0.25 and {sigma}_e_>~160km/s. We estimate that only about 10percent of nearby early-type galaxies contain cores. Furthermore, we show that there is a genuine population of fast rotators with cores. We also show that core fast rotators are morphologically, kinematically and dynamically different from core slow rotators. The cores of fast rotators, however, could harbour black holes of similar masses to those in core slow rotators, but typically more massive than those found in core-less fast rotators. Cores of both fast and slow rotators are made of old stars and found in galaxies typically lacking molecular or atomic gas (with a few exceptions). Core-less galaxies, and especially core-less fast rotators, are underluminous in the diffuse X-ray emission, but the presence of a core does not imply high X-ray luminosities. Additionally, we postulate (as many of these galaxies lack HST imaging) a possible population of core-less galaxies among slow rotators, which cannot be explained as face-on discs, but comprise a genuine sub-population of slow rotators. These galaxies are typically less massive and flatter than core slow rotators, and show evidence for dynamical cold structures and exponential photometric components. Based on our findings, major non-dissipative (gas-poor) mergers together with black hole binary evolution may not be the only path for formation of cores in early-type galaxies. We discuss possible processes for formation of cores and their subsequent preservation.
Galactic archaeology based on star counts is instrumental to reconstruct the past mass assembly of Local Group galaxies. The development of new observing techniques and data reduction, coupled with the use of sensitive large field of view cameras, now allows us to pursue this technique in more distant galaxies exploiting their diffuse low surface brightness (LSB) light. As part of the ATLAS3D project, we have obtained with the MegaCam camera at the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope extremely deep, multiband images of nearby early-type galaxies (ETGs). We present here a catalogue of 92 galaxies from the ATLAS3D sample, which are located in low- to medium-density environments. The observing strategy and data reduction pipeline, which achieve a gain of several magnitudes in the limiting surface brightness with respect to classical imaging surveys, are presented. The size and depth of the survey are compared to other recent deep imaging projects. The paper highlights the capability of LSB-optimized surveys at detecting new prominent structures that change the apparent morphology of galaxies. The intrinsic limitations of deep imaging observations are also discussed, among those, the contamination of the stellar haloes of galaxies by extended ghost reflections, and the cirrus emission from Galactic dust. The detection and systematic census of fine structures that trace the present and past mass assembly of ETGs are one of the prime goals of the project. We provide specific examples of each type of observed structures - tidal tails, stellar streams and shells - and explain how they were identified and classified. We give an overview of the initial results. The detailed statistical analysis will be presented in future papers.
Cross-identifying complex radio sources with optical or infrared (IR) counterparts in surveys such as the Australia Telescope Large Area Survey (ATLAS) has traditionally been performed manually. However, with new surveys from the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder detecting many tens of millions of radio sources, such an approach is no longer feasible. This paper presents new software (LRPY - Likelihood Ratio in PYthon) to automate the process of cross-identifying radio sources with catalogues at other wavelengths. lrpy implements the likelihood ratio (LR) technique with a modification to account for two galaxies contributing to a sole measured radio component. We demonstrate lrpy by applying it to ATLAS DR3 and a Spitzer-based multiwavelength fusion catalogue, identifying 3848 matched sources via our LR-based selection criteria. A subset of 1987 sources have flux density values for all IRAC bands which allow us to use criteria to distinguish between active galactic nuclei (AGNs) and star-forming galaxies (SFG). We find that 936 radio sources (~=47 per cent) meet both of the Lacy and Stern AGN selection criteria. Of the matched sources, 295 have spectroscopic redshifts and we examine the radio to IR flux ratio versus redshift, proposing an AGN selection criterion below the Elvis radio-loud AGN limit for this dataset. Taking the union of all three AGNs selection criteria we identify 956 as AGNs (~= 48 per cent). From this dataset, we find a decreasing fraction of AGNs with lower radio flux densities consistent with other results in the literature.
In a survey of 65 galaxies, Gao & Solomon (2004ApJS..152...63G) found a tight linear relation between the infrared luminosity (L_IR_, a proxy for the star formation rate) and the HCN(1-0) luminosity (L_HCN_). Wu et al. (2005ApJ...635L.173W) found that this relation extends from these galaxies to the much less luminous Galactic molecular high-mass star-forming clumps (~1pc scales), and posited that there exists a characteristic ratio L_IR_/L_HCN_ for high-mass star-forming clumps. The Gao-Solomon relation for galaxies could then be explained as a summation of large numbers of high-mass star-forming clumps, resulting in the same L_IR_/L_HCN_ ratio for galaxies. We test this explanation and other possible origins of the Gao-Solomon relation using high-density tracers (including HCN(1-0), N_2_H^+^(1-0), HCO^+^(1-0), HNC(1-0), HC_3_N(10-9), and C_2_H(1-0)) for ~300 Galactic clumps from the Millimetre Astronomy Legacy Team 90GHz (MALT90) survey. The MALT90 data show that the Gao-Solomon relation in galaxies cannot be satisfactorily explained by the blending of large numbers of high-mass clumps in the telescope beam. Not only do the clumps have a large scatter in the L_IR_/L_HCN_ ratio, but also far too many high-mass clumps are required to account for the Galactic IR and HCN luminosities. We suggest that the scatter in the L_IR_/L_HCN_ ratio converges to the scatter of the Gao-Solomon relation at some size-scale >~1kpc. We suggest that the Gao-Solomon relation could instead result from of a universal large-scale star formation efficiency, initial mass function, core mass function, and clump mass function.
The APEX Telescope Large Area Survey: The Galaxy (ATLASGAL) is an unbiased continuum survey of the inner Galactic disk at 870 micron. It covers +/-60{deg} in Galactic longitude and aims to find all massive clumps at various stages of high-mass star formation in the inner Galaxy, particularly the earliest evolutionary phases. We aim to determine properties such as the gas kinetic temperature and dynamics of new massive cold clumps found by ATLASGAL. Most importantly, we derived their kinematical distances from the measured line velocities. We observed the ammonia (J,K)=(1,1) to (3,3) inversion transitions toward 862 clumps of a flux-limited sample of submm clumps detected by ATLASGAL and extracted ^13^CO(1-0) spectra from the Galactic Ring Survey (GRS). We determined distances for a subsample located at the tangential points (71 sources) and for 277 clumps whose near/far distance ambiguity is resolved. Most ATLASGAL clumps are cold with rotational temperatures from 10-30K with a median of 17K. They have a wide range of NH_3_ linewidths (1-7km/s with 1.9km/s as median, which by far exceeds the thermal linewidth, as well as a broad distribution of high column densities from 10^14^ to 10^16^cm^-2^ (median of 2x10^15^cm^-2^) with an NH_3_ abundance in the range of 5 to 30x10^-8^. ATLASGAL sources are massive, >100M_{sun}_, and a fraction of clumps with a broad linewidth is in virial equilibrium. We found an enhancement of clumps at Galactocentric radii of 4.5 and 6kpc. The comparison of the NH_3_ lines as high-density probes with the GRS ^13^CO emission as low-density envelope tracer yields broader linewidths for ^13^CO than for NH_3_. The small differences in derived clump velocities between NH_3_ (representing dense core material) and ^13^CO (representing more diffuse molecular cloud gas) suggests that the cores are essentially at rest relative to the surrounding giant molecular cloud. The high detection rate (87%) confirms ammonia as an excellent probe of the molecular content of the massive, cold clumps revealed by ATLASGAL. A clear trend of increasing rotational temperatures and linewidths with evolutionary stage is seen for source samples ranging from 24 micron dark clumps to clumps with embedded HII regions. The survey provides the largest ammonia sample of high-mass star forming clumps and thus presents an important repository for the characterization of statistical properties of the clumps and the selection of subsamples for detailed, high-resolution follow-up studies.
The APEX Telescope Large Area Survey of the Galaxy (ATLASGAL) is the largest and most sensitive systematic survey of the inner Galactic plane in the submillimetre wavelength regime. The observations were carried out with the Large APEX Bolometer Camera (LABOCA), an array of 295 bolometers observing at 870um (345GHz). In this research note we present the compact source catalogue for the 280{deg}<l<330{deg}and 21{deg}<l<60{deg}regions of this survey. The construction of this catalogue was made with the source extraction routine SExtractor using the same input parameters and procedures as used to analyse the inner Galaxy region presented in an earlier publication (i.e., 330{deg}<l<21{deg}). We have identified 3523 compact sources and present a catalogue of their properties. When combined with the regions already published (see Contreras et al., 2013, Cat. J/A+A/549/A45), this provides a comprehensive and unbiased database of ~10163 massive, dense clumps located across the inner Galaxy.
The ATLASGAL compact source catalog is based on the ATLASGAL survey. This survey was made using the LABOCA bolometer array at APEX, at 870-microns covering the Galactic Plane between 330 degrees and 21-degrees in Galactic longitude and -1.5 to +1.5-degrees in Galactic Latitude. This catalog was created using SEXTRACTOR and contains 6639 sources, with a 99% completeness for sources with peak flux above 6{sigma}.
We study the properties of filamentary structures from the ATLASGAL survey. We use the DisPerSE algorithm to identify spatially coherent structures located across the inner-Galaxy (300<l<60 and |b|<1.5). We have determined distances, masses and physical sizes for 241 of the filamentary structures. We find a median distance of 3.8kpc, a mean mass of a few 10^3^M_{sun}_, a mean length of ~6pc and a mass-to-length ratio of (M/L)~200-2000M_sun/pc. We also find that these filamentary structures are tightly correlated with the spiral arms in longitude and velocity, and that their semi-major axis is preferentially aligned parallel to the Galactic mid-plane and therefore with the direction of large-scale Galactic magnetic field. We find many examples where the dense filaments identified in ATLASGAL are associated with larger scale filamentary structures (~100pc), and argue that this is likely to be common, and as such these may indicate a connection between large-scale Galactic dynamics and star formation. We have produced a large and Galaxy-wide catalogue of dense filamentary structures that are representative of a particular size and mass range not previously well studied in the literature. Analyses of the properties and distribution of these filaments reveals that they are correlated with the spiral arms and make a significant contribution to star formation in the Galaxy. Massive star formation is ongoing within ~20% of the filaments and is strongly correlated with the filaments with the largest mass-to- length ratios. The luminosity of the embedded sources has a similar distribution to the Galactic-wide samples of young massive stars and can therefore be considered to be representative.