The SDSS DR6 luminosity functions of galaxies

By A. Montero-Dorta, Francisco Prada. 2008

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We present number counts, luminosity functions (LFs) and luminosity densities of galaxies obtained using the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Sixth Data Release in all SDSS photometric bands. Thanks to the SDSS DR6, galaxy statistics have increased by a factor of ∼ 9 in the u-band and by a factor of ∼ 4 − 5 in the rest of the SDSS bands with respect to the previous work of Blanton et al. (2003b). In addition, we have achieved a high redshift completeness in our galaxy samples. Firstly, by making use of the survey masks, provided by the NYU-VAGC DR6, we have been able to define an area on the sky of high angular redshift completeness. Secondly, we guarantee that brightness-dependent redshift incompleteness is small within the magnitude ranges that define our galaxy samples. With these advances, we have estimated very accurate SDSS DR6 LFs in both the bright and the faint end. In the 0.1 r-band, our SDSS DR6 luminosity function is well fitted by a Schechter LF with parameters �� = 0.90 ±0.07, M�−5log10h = −20.73±0.04and � = −1.23±0.02. As compared with previous results, we find some notable differences. In the bright end of the 0.1 u-band luminosity function we find a remarkable excess, of ∼ 1.7 dex at M0.1u ≃ −20.5, with respect to the bestfit Schechter LF. This excess weakens in the 0.1 g-band, fading away towards the very red 0.1 z-band. A preliminary analysis on the nature of this bright-end bump reveals that it is mostly comprised of active galaxies and QSOs. It seems, therefore, that an important fraction of this exceeding luminosity may come from nuclear activity. In the faint end of the SDSS DR6 luminosity functions, where we can reach 1 − 1.5 magnitudes deeper than the previous SDSS LF estimation, we obtain a steeper slope, that increases from the 0.1 u-band, with � = −1.01 ± 0.03, to the very red 0.1 z-band, with � = −1.26±0.03. These state-of-the-art results may be used to constrain a variety of aspects of star formation histories and/or feed-back processes in galaxy formation models.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/2036ef7a1de370a7b42a7d0d8ef93ea68ba7b48f

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Citations in the corpus

GALAXIES IN ΛCDM WITH HALO ABUNDANCE MATCHING: LUMINOSITY–VELOCITY RELATION, BARYONIC MASS–VELOCITY RELATION, VELOCITY FUNCTION, AND CLUSTERING (2010, methodology): “The full curve in this plot shows results obtained using the Montero-Dorta & Prada (2009) LF of galaxies in the SDSS DR6 sample and uses the AC model of Blumenthal et al. (1986).”
Galaxy and Mass Assembly (GAMA): ugriz galaxy luminosity functions (2011, methodology): “Galaxy LFs have previously been measured in the ugriz bands from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS, York et al. 2000) by Blanton et al. (2003b), Loveday (2004), Blanton et al. (2005b), Montero-Dorta & Prada (2009), and Hill et al. (2010).”
Semi-analytic modelling of the extragalactic background light and consequences for extragalactic gamma-ray spectra: Modelling of the EBL and gamma-ray spectra (2012, background): “The work of Marchesini et al. (2007) is shown as open purple hexes. z band: local measurements are provided by Montero-Dorta & Prada (2009) (red) and Blanton et al. (2003) (green).”
CHARACTERIZING THE CIRCUMGALACTIC MEDIUM OF NEARBY GALAXIES WITH HST/COS AND HST/STIS ABSORPTION-LINE SPECTROSCOPY (2012, background): “In black and yellow lines are results from the halo matching schemes for the Marzke et al. (1994) B-band luminosity function and the SDSS r-band luminosity function of Montero-Dorta & Prada (2009), respectively.”
Semi-analytic modeling of the EBL and consequences for extragalactic gamma-ray spectra (2011, background): “The work of Marchesini et al. (2007) is shown as open purple hexes. z band: local measurements are provided by Montero-Dorta & Prada (2009) (red) and Blanton et al. (2003) (green).”
THE VELOCITY WIDTH FUNCTION OF GALAXIES FROM THE 40% ALFALFA SURVEY: SHEDDING LIGHT ON THE COLD DARK MATTER OVERABUNDANCE PROBLEM (2011, background): “…to the distribution of halo masses predicted by CDM, are raised by the flatness of the galactic luminosity function (LF, Blanton et al. 2005; Montero-Dorta & Prada 2009), HI mass function (HIMF, Martin et al. 2010) and galactic stellar mass function (GSMF, Baldry et al. 2008; Li & White…”