We present a modified version of the L-GALAXIES 2020 semi-analytic model of galaxy evolution, which includes significantly increased direct metal enrichment of the circumgalactic medium (CGM) by supernovae (SNe). These more metal-rich outflows do not require increased mass-loading factors, in contrast to some other galaxy evolution models. This modified L-GALAXIES 2020 model is able to simultaneously reproduce the gas-phase metallicity $(Z_{\rm g})$ and stellar metallicity $(Z_{*})$ radial profiles observed in nearby disc galaxies by MaNGA and MUSE, as well as the observed mass - metallicity relations for gas and stars at $z=0$ and their evolution back to $z\sim{}2-3$. A direct CGM enrichment fraction of $\sim{}90\%$ for SNe-II is preferred. We find that massive disc galaxies have slightly flatter $Z_{\rm g}$ profiles than their lower-mass counterparts in L-GALAXIES 2020, due to more efficient enrichment of their outskirts via inside-out growth and metal-rich accretion. Such a weak, positive correlation between stellar mass and $Z_{\rm g}$ profile slope is also seen in our MaNGA-DR15 sample of 571 star-forming disc galaxies. Although, below ${\rm log}(M_{*}/{\rm M}_{\odot})\sim{}10.0$ this observational result is strongly dependent on the metallicity diagnostic and morphological selection chosen. In addition, a lowered maximum SN-II progenitor mass of $25{\rm M}_{\odot}$, reflecting recent theoretical and observational estimates, can also provide a good match to observed metallicity profiles at $z=0$ in L-GALAXIES 2020. However, this model version fails to reproduce an evolution in $Z_{\rm g}$ at fixed mass over cosmic time, or the magnesium abundances observed in the intracluster medium (ICM).
We study the correlation between stellar mass and stellar metallicity in the Evolution and Assembly of GaLaxies and their Environments (EAGLE) suite of cosmological hydrodynamical simulations. At a given stellar mass, simulated galaxies with lower stellar metallicities show, on average, higher gas fractions, higher specific star formation rates and younger stellar populations. Active galactic nuclei feedback seems to play an important role on the determination of the stellar metallicity at high stellar masses. In general, simulated systems follow a well-defined anticorrelation between stellar …
Although the colour distribution of globular clusters in massive galaxies is well known to be bimodal, the spectroscopic metallicity distribution has been measured in only a few galaxies. After redefining the calcium triplet index-metallicity relation, we use our relation to derive the metallicity of 903 globular clusters in 11 early-type galaxies. This is the largest sample of spectroscopic globular cluster metallicities yet assembled. We compare these metallicities with those derived from Lick indices finding good agreement. In 6 of the 8 galaxies with sufficient numbers of high quality spec…
Two recent empirical developments in the study of extragalactic globular cluster (GC) populations are the color-magnitude relation of the blue GCs (the "blue tilt") and the nonlinearity of the dependence of optical GC colors on metallicity. The color-magnitude relation, interpreted as a mass-metallicity relation, is thought to be a consequence of self-enrichment. Nonlinear color-metallicity relations have been shown to produce bimodal color distributions from unimodal metallicity distributions. We simulate GC populations including both a mass-metallicity scaling relation and nonlinear color-me…
The metallicity of strong HI systems, spanning from damped Lyman-alpha absorbers (DLAs) to Lyman-limit systems (LLSs) is explored between z = 5->0 using the EAGLE high-resolution cosmological hydrodynamic simulation of galaxy formation. The metallicities of LLSs and DLAs steadily increase with time in agreement with observations. DLAs are more metal rich than LLSs, although the metallicities in the LLS column density range (NHI = 10^17 -10^20 cm^-2) are relatively flat, evolving from a median HI-weighted metallicity of Z<10^-2 Zsol at z = 3 to ~10^-0.5 Zsol by z = 0. The metal content of HI sy…
We present new accurate measurements of the physical properties of a statistically significant sample of 103 galaxies at z~2 using near-infrared spectroscopy taken as part of the 3D-HST survey. We derive redshifts, metallicities and star formation rates (SFRs) from the [OII], [OIII] and Hbeta nebular emission lines and exploit the multi-wavelength photometry available in CANDELS to measure stellar masses. We find the mass-metallicity relation (MZR) derived from our data to have the same trend as previous determinations in the range 0<z<3, with lower mass galaxies having lower metallicities. Ho…
Recent chemical abundance measurements of damped Ly-alpha absorbers (DLAs) revealed an intrinsic scatter in their metallicity of ~0.5 dex out to z~5. In order to explore the origin of this scatter, we build a semi-analytic model which traces the chemical evolution of the interstellar matter in small regions of the Universe with different mean density, from over- to underdense regions. We show that the different histories of structure formation in these regions, namely halo abundance, mass and stellar content, is reflected in the chemical properties of the protogalaxies, and in particular of DL…
We present ISM and CGM metallicities for 25 absorption systems associated with isolated star-forming galaxies (<z>=0.28) with 9.4<log(M*/Msun)<10.9 and with absorption detected within 200kpc. Galaxy ISM metallicities were measured using Ha/[NII] emission lines from Keck/ESI spectra. CGM single-phase low-ionization metallicities were modeled using MCMC and Cloudy analysis of absorption from HST/COS and Keck/HIRES or VLT/UVES quasar spectra. We find that the star-forming galaxy ISM metallicities follow the observed stellar mass metallicity relation (scatter 0.19dex). CGM metallicity shows no dep…
The metallicity of diffuse ionised gas (DIG) cannot be determined using strong emission line diagnostics, which are calibrated to calculate the metallicity of Hii regions. Because of this, resolved metallicity maps from integral field spectroscopy (IFS) data remain largely incomplete. In this paper (the second of a series), we introduce the geostatistical technique of universal kriging, which allows the complete 2D metallicity distribution of a galaxy to be reconstructed from metallicities measured at Hii regions, accounting for spatial correlations between nearby data points. We apply this me…
Intrinsic iron abundance spreads in globular clusters, although usually small, are very common, and are signatures of self enrichment: some stars within the cluster have been enriched by supernova ejecta from other stars within the same cluster. We use the Bailin (2018) self enrichment model to predict the relationship between properties of the protocluster -- its mass and the metallicity of the protocluster gas cloud -- and the final observable properties today -- its current metallicity and the internal iron abundance spread. We apply this model to an updated catalog of Milky Way globular cl…
We quantified and calibrated the metallicity and temperature sensitivities of colors derived from nine Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) filters aboard the Hubble Space Telescope using Dartmouth isochrones and Kurucz atmospheres models. The theoretical isochrone colors were tested and calibrated against observations of five well studied galactic clusters: M92, NGC 6752, NGC 104, NGC 5927, and NGC 6791, all of which have spectroscopically determined metallicities spanning -2.30 < [Fe/H] < +0.4. We found empirical corrections to the Dartmouth isochrone grid for each of the following color magnitude dia…
The metallicity distribution function of globular clusters (GCs) in galaxies is a key to understanding galactic formation and evolution. The calcium II triplet (CaT) index has recently become a popular metal abundance indicator thanks to its sensitivity to GC metallicity. Here we revisit and assess the reliability of CaT as a metallicity indicator using our new stellar population synthesis simulations based on empirical, high-resolution fluxes. The model shows that the CaT strength of old ($>$ 10 Gyr) GCs is proportional to ${\rm [Fe/H]}$ below $-0.5$. In the modest metal-rich regime, however,…
Aims: To investigate a possible dependence between age and metallicity in the Magellanic Clouds (MCs) from a study of small open star clusters, using Strömgren photometry. Our goal is to trace evidence of an age metallicity relation (AMR) and correlate it with the mutual interactions of the two MCs. Our aim is also to correlate the AMR with the spatial distribution of the clusters. In the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), the majority of the selected clusters are young (up to 1 Gyr) and our aim is to search for an AMR at this epoch which has not been much studied. Methods: We report on results for…
We investigate the mass-metallicity relations for the gaseous (MZRgas) and stellar components (MZRstar) of local star-forming galaxies based on a representative sample from SDSS DR12. The mass-weighted average stellar metallicities are systematically lower than the gas metallicities. This difference in metallicity increases toward galaxies with lower masses and reaches 0.4-0.8 dex at 10^9 Msun (depending on the gas metallicity calibration). As a result, the MZRstar is much steeper than the MZRgas. The much lower metallicities in stars compared to the gas in low mass galaxies implies dramatic m…
We present spectra of 14 A-type supergiants in the metal-rich spiral galaxy M83. We derive stellar parameters and metallicities, and measure a spectroscopic distance modulus m-M = 28.47 +\- 0.10 (4.9 +\- 0.2 Mpc), in agreement with other methods. We use the stellar characteristic metallicity of M83 and other systems to discuss a version of the galaxy mass-metallicity relation that is independent of the analysis of nebular emission lines and the associated systematic uncertainties. We reproduce the radial metallicity gradient of M83, which flattens at large radii, with a chemical evolution mode…
The stellar populations of intermediate-redshift galaxies can shed light onto the growth of massive galaxies in the last 8 billion years. We perform deep, multi-object rest-frame optical spectroscopy with IMACS/Magellan of ~70 galaxies in the E-CDFS with redshift 0.65<z<0.75, apparent magnitude R>22.7 and stellar mass >10^{10}Msun. Following the Bayesian approach adopted for previous low-redshift studies, we constrain the stellar mass, mean stellar age and stellar metallicity of individual galaxies from stellar absorption features. We characterize for the first time the dependence of stellar m…
The stellar mass-metallicity relation ($M_* - Z$, MZR) indicates that the metallicities of galaxies increase with increasing stellar masses. The fundamental metallicity relation (FMR) suggests that the galaxies with higher star formation rates (SFRs) tend to have lower metallicities for a given stellar mass. To examine whether the MZR and FMR still hold at poorer metallicities and higher redshifts, we compile a sample of 35 star-forming galaxies (SFGs) at $0.6<z<0.9$ using the public spectral database ($\rm v5\_10\_0$) of emission-line galaxies from the extended Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopi…
Photometric metallicity for 694233 Galactic giant stars from Gaia DR3 synthetic Stromgren photometry. Metallicity distribution functions of halo sub-structures
We used the data of 701 stars covering the colour index interval 0.32<B-V<=1.16, with metallicities -1.76<=[Fe/H]<=+0.40 dex, which were taken from PASTEL catalogue and estimated metallicity dependent guillotine factors which provide a more accurate metallicity calibration. We reduced the metallicities of 11 authors to the metallicities of Valenti & Fischer (2005), thus obtained a homogeneous set of data which increased the accuracy of the calibration, i.e. [Fe/H]=-14.316*delta^{2}_{0.6}-3.557*delta_{0.6}+0.105. Comparison of the metallicity residuals, for two sets of data, based on the metall…
We examine how the small-scale ($<$\,kpc) variation of metallicity within a galaxy, which is found in nearby galaxies, affect the observational estimates of metallicity in the explosion sites of transient events such as core-collapse supernovae (CC SNe) and gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). Assuming the same luminosity, metallicity, and spatial distributions of \ion{H}{ii}\ regions (hereafter HIIRs) as observed in M31, we compute the apparent metallicities that we would obtain when the spectrum of a target region is blended with those of surrounding HIIRs within the length scale of typical spatial reso…
We present integrated-light spectra of 8 Young Massive Clusters (YMCs) in the metal-rich spiral galaxy NGC 5236 (M 83). The observations were taken with the X-Shooter spectrograph on the ESO Very Large Telescope. Through the use of theoretical isochrones and synthetic integrated-light (IL) spectra we derive metallicities and study the radial metallicity gradient observed through these young populations. For the inner regions of the galaxy we observe a relatively shallow metallicity gradient of $-$0.37 $\pm$0.29 dex R$_{25}^{-1}$, agreeing with chemical evolution models with an absence of infal…
The mass-metallicity relation shows that the galaxies with the lowest mass have the lowest metallicities. As most dwarf galaxies are in group environments, interaction effects such as tides could contribute to this trend. We perform a series of smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) simulations of dwarf galaxies in external tidal fields to examine the effects of tides on their metallicities and metallicity gradients. In our simulated galaxies, gravitational instabilities drive gas inwards and produce centralized star formation and a significant metallicity gradient. Strong tides can contribute …
Our ability to study the properties of the interstellar medium (ISM) in the earliest galaxies will rely on emission line diagnostics at rest-frame ultraviolet (UV) wavelengths. In this work, we identify metallicity-sensitive diagnostics using UV emission lines. We compare UV-derived metallicities with standard, well-established optical metallicities using a sample of galaxies with rest-frame UV and optical spectroscopy. We find that the He2-O3C3 diagnostic (He II 1640 / C III 1906,1909 vs. O III 1666 / C III 1906,1909) is a reliable metallicity tracer, particularly at low metallicity (12+log(O…
In this paper, we present a new method to constrain the metallicities of high redshift damped Ly$α$ (DLA) absorbers using observed extinction curves. This is the first time such an approach is employed to constrain the metallicities of extragalactic absorbers. To demonstrate our method, we use the spectra of 13 quasars and one GRB with DLA absorbers detected along their sightlines. By using the Kramers-Kronig (KK) relation, which relates the wavelength-integrated extinction to the total volume occupied by dust per hydrogen nucleon, we set some robust lower limits on the metallicity of the DLAs…
Cosmic metallicity evolution possibly creates the diversity of star formation modes at different epochs. Gravitational fragmentation of circumstellar discs provides an important formation channel of multiple star systems, including close binaries. We here study the nature of disc fragmentation, systematically performing a suite of two-dimensional radiation-hydrodynamic simulations, in a broad range of metallicities, from the primordial to the solar values. In particular, we follow relatively long-term disc evolution over 15 kyr after the disc formation, incorporating the effect of heating by t…
We measured metallicities for 33 z=3.4-4.2 absorption line systems drawn from a sample of H I-selected-Lyman limit systems (LLSs) identified in Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) quasar spectra and stratified based on metal line features. We obtained higher-resolution spectra with the Keck Echellette Spectrograph and Imager, selecting targets according to our stratification scheme in an effort to fully sample the LLS population metallicity distribution. We established a plausible range of H I column densities and measured column densities (or limits) for ions of carbon, silicon, and aluminum, fin…
Photometric Metallicities for 367,324 stars of Omega Centauri
Institute for Frontiers in Astronomy and Astrophysics, Beijing Normal University(北京师范大学前沿天体物理研究所);School of Physics and Astronomy, Beijing Normal University(北京师范大学物理与天文学院);Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Notre Dame(圣母大学物理与天文系);Joint Institute for Nuclear Astrophysics – Center for the Evolution of the Elements (JINA-CEE)(核天体物理联合中心——元素演化中心)
We explore how environment affects the metallicity of the circumgalactic medium (CGM) using 13 low mass galaxy groups (2-5 galaxies) at $\langle z_{abs}\rangle=0.25$ identified near background quasars. Using quasar spectra from HST/COS and from Keck/HIRES or VLT/UVES we measure column densities of, or determine limits on, CGM absorption lines. We use a Markov chain Monte Carlo approach with Cloudy to estimate metallicities of cool ($T\sim10^4$K) CGM gas within groups and compare them to CGM metallicities of 47 isolated galaxies. Both group and isolated CGM metallicities span a wide range ($-2<…
We perform a comparative analysis of the spatial distribution of young (<50 Myr) open star clusters and field Cepheids with different metallicities. A significant fraction of young clusters are shown to have low metallicities atypical of field Cepheids. Both types of objects exhibit approximately equal (in magnitude) negative radial metallicity gradients, while their azimuthal metallicity gradients differ outside the error limits and have opposite signs. Among the stellar complexes identified by young clusters, the most metal-poor clusters are grouped in the Perseus complex. It is the clusters…
We use data for 6048 early-type galaxies (ETGs) from Galaxy Zoo 1 that have been cross-matched with the catalog of the MPA-JHU emission-line measurements for the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 7. We measure the metallicity of these ETGs by excluding various ionization sources, and study other properties as well. We use the optimal division line of W2-W3 $=$ 2.5 as a diagnostic tool, and for the first time derive metallicity measurements for 2218 ETGs. We find that these ETGs actually are closer to H II regions as defined by Kauffmann et al. in the Baldwin-philips-Terevich diagram, and t…
The observed characteristics of globular cluster (GC) systems, such as metallicity distributions, are commonly used to place constraints on galaxy formation models. However, obtaining reliable metallicity values is particularly difficult because of our limited means to obtain high quality spectroscopy of extragalactic GCs. Often, `color--metallicity relations' are invoked to convert easier-to-obtain photometric measurements into metallicities, but there is no consensus on what form these relations should take. In this paper we make use of multiple photometric datasets and iron metallicity valu…
The gas-phase metallicity of low-mass galaxies increases with increasing stellar mass ($M_\ast$) and is nearly constant for high-mass galaxies. Theory suggests that this tight mass-metallicity relationship is shaped by galactic outflows removing metal-enriched gas from galaxies. Here, we observationally model the outflow metallicities of the warm outflowing phase from a sample of seven local star-forming galaxies with stellar masses between 10$^{7}$-10$^{11}$ M$_\odot$. We estimate the outflow metallicities using four weak rest-frame ultraviolet absorption lines, the observed stellar continua,…
We present the first metallicity distribution functions of the old field populations in the Magellanic Clouds. Our metallicities are based on the Fourier decomposition of Type ab RR Lyrae light curves from the Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment (OGLE-III). On the metallicity scale of Zinn & West; we find a mean metallicity of [Fe/H] = -1.50 +/- 0.24 dex based on 16776 RR Lyrae stars in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). For the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) we obtain -1.70 +/- 0.27 dex based on 1831 RR Lyrae stars. These uncertainties represent the intrinsic spread in the population rather…
The combination of gas-phase oxygen abundances and stellar metallicities can provide us with unique insights into the metal enrichment histories of galaxies. In this work, we compare the stellar and gas-phase metallicities measured within a 1$R_{e}$ aperture for a representative sample of 472 star-forming galaxies extracted from the SAMI Galaxy Survey. We confirm that the stellar and interstellar medium (ISM) metallicities are strongly correlated, with scatter $\sim$3 times smaller than that found in previous works, and that integrated stellar populations are generally more metal-poor than the…
Interpreting abundances of Damped Ly-$α$ Absorbers (DLAs) from absorption-line spectroscopy has typically been a challenge because of the presence of dust. Nevertheless, because DLAs trace distant gas-rich galaxies regardless of their luminosity, they provide an attractive way of measuring the evolution of the metallicity of the neutral gas with cosmic time. This has been done extensively so far, but typically not taking proper dust corrections into account. The aims of this paper are to: i) provide a simplified way of calculating dust corrections, based on a single observed [$X$/Fe], ii) asse…
In a series of three papers, we investigate the current status of published metallicities for open clusters that were derived from a variety of photometric and spectroscopic methods. The current article focuses on spectroscopic methods. The aim is to compile a comprehensive set of clusters with the most reliable metallicities from high-resolution spectroscopic studies. This set of metallicities will be the basis for a calibration of metallicities from different methods. The literature was searched for [Fe/H] estimates of individual member stars of open clusters based on the analysis of high-re…
We present new period-$ϕ_{31}$-[Fe/H] relations for first overtone RRL stars (RRc), calibrated over a broad range of metallicities ($-2.5 < \textrm{[Fe/H]}< 0.0$) utilizing the largest currently available set of Galactic halo field RRL with homogeneous spectroscopic metallicities. Our relations are defined in the optical (ASAS-SN $V$-band) and, inaugurally, in the infrared (WISE $W1$ and $W2$ bands). Our $V$-band relation can reproduce individual RRc spectroscopic metallicities with a dispersion of 0.30 dex over the entire metallicity range of our calibrator sample (an RMS smaller than what we…
The combination of spectroscopic stellar metallicities and resolved star color-magnitude diagrams (CMDs) has the potential to constrain the entire star formation and chemical enrichment history (SFH) of a galaxy better than fitting CMDs alone (as is most common in SFH studies using resolved stellar populations). In this paper, two approaches for incorporating external metallicity information into color-magnitude diagram fitting techniques are presented. Overall, the joint fitting of metallicity and CMD information can increase the precision on measured age-metallicity relationships and star fo…
Context: The formation and evolution of disk galaxies are long standing questions in Astronomy. Understanding the properties of globular cluster systems can lead to important insights on the evolution of its host galaxy. Aims: We aim to obtain the stellar population parameters - age and metallicity - of a sample of M31 and Galactic globular clusters. Studying their globular cluster systems is an important step towards understanding their formation and evolution in a complete way. Methods: Our analysis employs a modern pixel-to-pixel spectral fitting technique to fit observed integrated spectra…
Fragmentation of protostellar disks controls the growth of protostars and plays a key role in determining the final mass of newborn stars. In this paper, we investigate the structure and gravitational stability of the protostellar disks in the full metallicity range between zero and the solar value. Using the mass-accretion rates evaluated from the thermal evolution in the preceding collapse phase of the pre-stellar cores, we calculate disk structures and their evolution in the framework of the standard steady disks. Overall, with higher metallicity, more efficient cooling results in the lower…
The mass-metallicity relation (MZR) of type-2 active galactic nuclei (AGNs) at 1.2 < z < 4.0 is investigated by using high-z radio galaxies (HzRGs) and X-ray selected radio-quiet AGNs. We combine new rest-frame ultraviolet (UV) spectra of two radio-quiet type-2 AGNs obtained with FOCAS on the Subaru Telescope with existing rest-frame UV emission lines, i.e., CIV1549, HeII1640, and CIII]1909, of a sample of 16 HzRGs and 6 additional X-ray selected type-2 AGNs, whose host stellar masses have been estimated in literature. We divided our sample in three stellar mass bins and calculated averaged em…
We present new Stromgren and Washington data sets for the Bootes I dwarf galaxy, and combine them with the available SDSS photometry. The goal of this project is to refine a ground-based, practical, accurate method to determine age and metallicity for individual stars in Bootes I that can be selected in an unbiased imaging survey, without having to take spectra. We produce photometric metallicities from Stromgren and Washington photometry, for stellar systems with a range of $-1.0>[Fe/H]>-3.5$. To avoid the decrease in sensitivity of the Stromgren metallicity index on the lower red-giant branc…
Gas-phase metallicities of galaxies are typically measured through auroral or nebular emission lines, but metallicity also leaves an imprint on the overall spectral energy distribution (SED) of a galaxy and can be estimated through SED fitting. We use the ProSpect SED fitting code with a flexible parametric star formation history and an evolving metallicity history to self-consistently measure metallicities, stellar mass, and other galaxy properties for $\sim90\,000$ galaxies from the Deep Extragalactic VIsible Legacy Survey (DEVILS) and Galaxy and Mass Assembly (GAMA) survey. We use these to …
Aims. We use the spectra of more than 30,000 red giant branch (RGB) stars in 25 globular clusters (GC), obtained within the MUSE survey of Galactic globular clusters, to calibrate the Ca II triplet (CaT) metallicity relation and derive metallicities for all individual stars. We investigate the overall metallicity distributions as well as those of the different populations within each cluster. Methods. The Ca II triplet in the near-infrared at 8498, 8542, and 8662 AA is visible in stars with spectral types between F and M and can be used to determine their metallicities. In this work, we calibr…
The fragmentation process in collapsing clouds with various metallicities is studied using three-dimensional nested-grid hydrodynamics. Initial clouds are specified by three parameters: cloud metallicity, initial rotation energy and initial cloud shape. For different combinations of these parameters, we calculate 480 models in total and study cloud evolution, fragmentation conditions, orbital separation and binary frequency. For the cloud to fragment during collapse, the initial angular momentum must be higher than a threshold value, which decreases with decreasing metallicity. Although the ex…
It is known that the GRB equivalent hydrogen column density (NHX) changes with redshift and that, typically, NHX is greater than the GRB host neutral hydrogen column density. We have compiled a large sample of data for GRB NHX and metallicity [X/H]. The main aims of this paper are to generate improved NHX for our sample by using actual metallicities, dust corrected where available for detections, and for the remaining GRB, a more realistic average intrinsic metallicity using a standard adjustment from solar. Then, by approximating the GRB host intrinsic hydrogen column density using the measur…
In this paper, we discuss the properties of CMDs, age, metallicity and radial velocities of eight massive LMC clusters using data taken from FORS2 multiobject spectrograph at the 8.2-meter VLT/UT1. The strong near-infrared Ca II triplet (CaT) lines of RGB stars obtained from the high S/N spectra are used to determine the metallicity and radial velocity of cluster members. We report for the first time spectroscopically determined metallicity values for four clusters based on the mean [Fe/H] value of ~10 cluster members each. We found two concentrations in the distribution of ages of the target …
Observations of galaxies in the local Universe have shown that both the ionized gas and the stars of satellites are more metal-rich than of equally massive centrals. To gain insight into the connection between this metallicity enhancement and other differences between centrals and satellites, such as their star formation rates, gas content, and growth history, we study the metallicities of >3600 galaxies with M_star > 10^10 M_sun in the cosmological hydrodynamical EAGLE 100 Mpc `Reference' simulation, including ~1500 in the vicinity of galaxy groups and clusters (M_200 >= 10^13 M_sun). The sim…
This work presents measurements of the local HII environment metallicities of core-collapse supernovae (SNe) within a luminosity distance of 30 Mpc. 76 targets were observed at the Isaac Newton Telescope and environment metallicities could be measured for 65 targets using the N2 and O3N2 strong emission line method. The cumulative distribution functions (CDFs) of the environment metallicities of Type Ib and Ic SNe tend to higher metallicity than Type IIP, however Type Ic are also present at lower metallicities whereas Type Ib are not. The Type Ib frequency distribution is narrower (standard de…
We present a comparative study of the relation between the aperture-based gas-phase metallicity and three structural parameters of star-forming galaxies: mass ($\mathrm{M \equiv M_*}$), average potential ($Φ\equiv \mathrm{M_*/R_e}$) and average surface mass density ($Σ\equiv \mathrm{M_*/R_e^2}$; where $\mathrm{R_e}$ is the effective radius). We use a volume-limited sample drawn from the publicly available SDSS DR7, and base our analysis on aperture-matched sampling by selecting sets of galaxies where the SDSS fibre probes a fixed fraction of $\mathrm{R_e}$. We find that between 0.5 and 1.5 $\m…
In this work we present an analysis of the behaviour of galaxies in a four-dimensional parameter space defined by stellar mass, metallicity, star formation rate, and molecular gas mass. We analyse a combined sample of 227 galaxies, which draws from a number of surveys across the redshift range 0 < z < 2 (> 90% of the sample at z~0), and covers > 3 decades in stellar mass.Using Principle Component Analysis, we demonstrate that galaxies in our sample lie on a 2-dimensional plane within this 4D parameter space, indicative of galaxies that exist in an equilibrium between gas inflow and outflow. Fu…
The theory for the formation of the first population of stars (Pop III) predicts an initial mass function (IMF) dominated by high-mass stars, in contrast to the present-day IMF, which tends to yield mostly stars with masses less than 1 M_Sol. The leading theory for the transition in the characteristic stellar mass predicts that the cause is the extra cooling provided by increasing metallicity. In particular, dust can overtake H_2 as the leading coolant at very high densities. The aim of this work is to determine the influence of dust cooling on the fragmentation of very low metallicity gas. To…
We present the results of a study utilising ultra-deep, rest-frame UV, spectroscopy to quantify the relationship between stellar mass and stellar metallicity for 681 star-forming galaxies at $2.5<z<5.0$ ($\langle z \rangle = 3.5 \pm 0.6$) drawn from the VANDELS survey. Via a comparison with high-resolution stellar population models, we determine stellar metallicities for a set of composite spectra formed from subsamples selected by mass and redshift. Across the stellar mass range $8.5 < \mathrm{log}(\langle M_{\ast} \rangle/\rm{M}_{\odot}) < 10.2$ we find a strong correlation between stellar m…
We present results obtained from Stromgren photometry of 13 young (~30-220 Myr) Magellanic Cloud (MC) clusters, most of them lacking in the literature from direct metallicity measurements. We derived for them [Fe/H] values from a high-dispersion spectroscopy-based empirical calibration of the Stromgren metallicity sensitive index m1 for yellow and red supergiants (SGs). Particular care was given while estimating their respective uncertainties. In order to obtain the mean cluster metallicities, we used [Fe/H] values of selected SGs for which we required to be located within the cluster radii, p…
In an earlier paper we modeled the far-infrared emission from a star-forming galaxy using the photoionisation code CLOUDY and presented metallicity sensitive diagnostics based on far-infrared fine structure line ratios. Here, we focus on the applicability of the [OIII]88/[NII]122 microns line ratio as a gas phase metallicity indicator in high redshift submillimetre luminous galaxies. The [OIII]88/[NII]122 microns ratio is strongly dependent on the ionization parameter (which is related to the total number of ionizing photons) as well as the gas electron density. We demonstrate how the ratio of…