arXivDaily arXiv每日学术速递 周一至周五更新
arXiv 1009.5992astro-ph.COastro-ph.GAastro-ph.SR
收藏

发光椭圆星系中的大量低质量恒星

A Substantial Population of Low Mass Stars in Luminous Elliptical Galaxies

Pieter van Dokkum, Charlie Conroy

摘要:

恒星初始质量函数(IMF)描述了恒星形成时的质量分布,对天体物理学的许多领域都具有重要意义。IMF在银河系的圆盘中受到相当好的约束,但我们对其他星系和早期宇宙时代IMF的形式几乎没有直接的信息。在这里,我们研究恒星的质量函数在椭圆星系的测量强度的Na I的双重和Wing-Ford分子FeH带的光谱。这些线在质量小于0.3 Msun的恒星中很强,而在所有其他类型的恒星中很弱或不存在。我们明确地检测到这两个签名,与以前的研究是基于较低的信噪比的数据相一致。对低质量恒星光的直接探测表明,它们在椭圆星系中非常丰富,占恒星总数的80%以上,占恒星总质量的60%以上。我们推断,早期宇宙中大质量恒星形成星系中的IMF比银河系盘中的IMF产生了更多的低质量恒星,并且在0.1 - 1兆太阳质量范围内可能比Salpeter形式稍微陡一些。

英文摘要:

The stellar initial mass function (IMF) describes the mass distribution of stars at the time of their formation and is of fundamental importance for many areas of astrophysics. The IMF is reasonably well constrained in the disk of the Milky Way but we have very little direct information on the form of the IMF in other galaxies and at earlier cosmic epochs. Here we investigate the stellar mass function in elliptical galaxies by measuring the strength of the Na I doublet and the Wing-Ford molecular FeH band in their spectra. These lines are strong in stars with masses <0.3 Msun and weak or absent in all other types of stars. We unambiguously detect both signatures, consistent with previous studies that were based on data of lower signal-to-noise ratio. The direct detection of the light of low mass stars implies that they are very abundant in elliptical galaxies, making up >80% of the total number of stars and contributing >60% of the total stellar mass. We infer that the IMF in massive star-forming galaxies in the early Universe produced many more low mass stars than the IMF in the Milky Way disk, and was probably slightly steeper than the Salpeter form in the mass range 0.1 - 1 Msun.

机构、总结、中文摘要均由AI分析而来,可能存在错误,请以论文正文为准。

↑