GROUND-BASED Paα NARROW-BAND IMAGING OF LOCAL LUMINOUS INFRARED GALAXIES. I. STAR FORMATION RATES AND SURFACE DENSITIES

Journal Article · Sun Mar 15 00:00:00 EDT 2015 · Astrophysical Journal, Supplement Series

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1088/0067-0049/217/1/1· OSTI ID:22520078

Tateuchi, Ken; Konishi, Masahiro; Motohara, Kentaro; Takahashi, Hidenori; Kato, Natsuko Mitani; Kitagawa, Yutaro; Todo, Soya; Toshikawa, Koji; Sako, Shigeyuki; Uchimoto, Yuka K.; Ohsawa, Ryou; Asano, Kentaro; Kamizuka, Takafumi; Nakamura, Tomohiko; Okada, Kazushi ^[1]; Ita, Yoshifusa ^[2]; Komugi, Shinya ^[3]; Koshida, Shintaro ^[4]; Manabe, Sho ^[5]; Nakashima, Asami ^[6] ; others, and

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1. Institute of Astronomy, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, 2-21-1 Osawa, Mitaka, Tokyo 181-0015 (Japan)
2. Astronomical Institute, Tohoku University, 6-3 Aoba, Aramaki, Aoba-ku, Sendai, Miyagi 980-8578 (Japan)
3. Division of Liberal Arts, Kogakuin University, 2665-1, Hachioji, Tokyo 192-0015 (Japan)
4. Subaru Telescope, National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, Hilo, HI 96720 (United States)
5. Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Kobe University, Kobe 657-8501 (Japan)
6. Department of Astronomy, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-0033 (Japan)

Luminous infrared galaxies (LIRGs) are enshrouded by a large amount of dust produced by their active star formation, and it is difficult to measure their activity in optical wavelengths. We have carried out Paα narrow-band imaging observations of 38 nearby star forming galaxies including 33 LIRGs listed in the IRAS Revised Bright Galaxy Sample catalog with the Atacama Near InfraRed camera on the University of Tokyo Atacama Observatory (TAO) 1.0 m telescope (miniTAO). Star formation rates (SFRs) estimated from the Paα fluxes, corrected for dust extinction using the Balmer decrement method (typically A{sub V} ∼ 4.3 mag), show a good correlation with those from the bolometric infrared luminosity of the IRAS data within a scatter of 0.27 dex. This suggests that the correction of dust extinction for the Paα flux is sufficient in our sample. We measure the physical sizes and surface densities of infrared luminosities (Σ{sub L(IR)}) and the SFR (Σ{sub SFR}) of star forming regions for individual galaxies, and we find that most of the galaxies follow a sequence of local ultra-luminous or luminous infrared galaxies (U/LIRGs) on the L(IR)-Σ{sub L(IR)} and SFR-Σ{sub SFR} plane. We confirm that a transition of the sequence from normal galaxies to U/LIRGs is seen at L(IR) = 8 × 10{sup 10} L {sub ☉}. Also, we find that there is a large scatter in physical size, different from normal galaxies or ULIRGs. Considering the fact that most U/LIRGs are merging or interacting galaxies, this scatter may be caused by strong external factors or differences in their merging stages.

• OSTI ID: 22520078
• Journal Information: Astrophysical Journal, Supplement Series, Vol. 217, Issue 1; Other Information: Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0067-0049
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

79 ASTROPHYSICS
COSMOLOGY AND ASTRONOMY
BOLOMETERS
CAMERAS
CATALOGS
CORRECTIONS
CORRELATIONS
COSMIC DUST
DENSITY
GALAXIES
INFRARED SPECTRA
LUMINOSITY
STAR EVOLUTION
STARS
SURFACES
TELESCOPES