Stellar populations of early-type galaxies with mid-infrared excess emission
- Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute, Daejeon 34055 (Korea, Republic of)
We present a stellar population analysis of quiescent (without Hα emission) and bright (M{sub r} < −21.5) early-type galaxies (ETGs) with recent star formation. The ETGs are selected from a spectroscopic sample of SDSS galaxies at 0.04 < z < 0.11 with WISE mid-infrared (IR) and GALEX near-ultraviolet (UV) emissions. We stack the optical spectra of ETGs with different amounts of mid-IR and near-UV excess emissions to measure the strength of 4000 Å break D{sub n}4000 and the width of Balmer absorption line Hδ{sub A} that are indicative of recent (∼1 Gyr) star formation activity. The WISE [3.4]–[12] colors show stronger correlations with the spectral features than NUV–r colors. We fit to the stacked spectra with a spectral fitting code, STARLIGHT, and find that the mass fraction of young (⩽1 Gyr) and intermediate-age (∼1–5 Gyr) stars in the ETGs with mid-IR excess emission is ∼4%–11%, depending on the template spectrum used for the fit. These results show that the ETGs with mid-IR excess emission have experienced star formation within the last 1–5 Gyr and that the mid-IR emission is a useful diagnostic tool for probing recent star formation activity in ETGs.
- OSTI ID:
- 22890094
- Journal Information:
- Astrophysical Journal, Vol. 820, Issue 2; Other Information: Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); Since 2009, the country of publication for this journal is the UK.; ISSN 0004-637X
- Country of Publication:
- United Kingdom
- Language:
- English
Similar Records
Clues on the history of early-type galaxies from SDSS spectra and GALEX photometry
UV-BRIGHT NEARBY EARLY-TYPE GALAXIES OBSERVED IN THE MID-INFRARED: EVIDENCE FOR A MULTI-STAGE FORMATION HISTORY BY WAY OF WISE AND GALEX IMAGING