MASS AND ENVIRONMENT AS DRIVERS OF GALAXY EVOLUTION IN SDSS AND zCOSMOS AND THE ORIGIN OF THE SCHECHTER FUNCTION

By Yingjie Peng, S. Lilly, K. Kovač, M. Bolzonella, L. Pozzetti, A. Renzini, G. Zamorani, O. Ilbert, C. Knobel, A. Iovino and 54 more. 2010

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We explore the simple inter-relationships between mass, star formation rate, and environment in the SDSS, zCOSMOS, and other deep surveys. We take a purely empirical approach in identifying those features of galaxy evolution that are demanded by the data and then explore the analytic consequences of these. We show that the differential effects of mass and environment are completely separable to z ∼ 1, leading to the idea of two distinct processes of “mass quenching” and “environment quenching.” The effect of environment quenching, at fixed over-density, evidently does not change with epoch to z ∼ 1 in zCOSMOS, suggesting that the environment quenching occurs as large-scale structure develops in the universe, probably through the cessation of star formation in 30%–70% of satellite galaxies. In contrast, mass quenching appears to be a more dynamic process, governed by a quenching rate. We show that the observed constancy of the Schechter M* and αs for star-forming galaxies demands that the quenching of galaxies around and above M* must follow a rate that is statistically proportional to their star formation rates (or closely mimic such a dependence). We then postulate that this simple mass-quenching law in fact holds over a much broader range of stellar mass (2 dex) and cosmic time. We show that the combination of these two quenching processes, plus some additional quenching due to merging naturally produces (1) a quasi-static single Schechter mass function for star-forming galaxies with an exponential cutoff at a value M* that is set uniquely by the constant of proportionality between the star formation and mass quenching rates and (2) a double Schechter function for passive galaxies with two components. The dominant component (at high masses) is produced by mass quenching and has exactly the same M* as the star-forming galaxies but a faint end slope that differs by Δαs ∼ 1. The other component is produced by environment effects and has the same M* and αs as the star-forming galaxies but an amplitude that is strongly dependent on environment. Subsequent merging of quenched galaxies will modify these predictions somewhat in the denser environments, mildly increasing M* and making αs slightly more negative. All of these detailed quantitative inter-relationships between the Schechter parameters of the star-forming and passive galaxies, across a broad range of environments, are indeed seen to high accuracy in the SDSS, lending strong support to our simple empirically based model. We find that the amount of post-quenching “dry merging” that could have occurred is quite constrained. Our model gives a prediction for the mass function of the population of transitory objects that are in the process of being quenched. Our simple empirical laws for the cessation of star formation in galaxies also naturally produce the “anti-hierarchical” run of mean age with mass for passive galaxies, as well as the qualitative variation of formation timescale indicated by the relative α-element abundances.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Nuclear and High Energy Physics

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/459b293a867451edd4dc9ed3284842f5bef368c4

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Citations in the corpus

A fundamental problem in our understanding of low-mass galaxy evolution (2012, methodology): “The mean sSFR for centrals and satellites together, which one could argue should be used, is slightly higher, log(sSFR)=-9.89 at log(Mstar/M⊙)=9.55. simple model (see Peng et al. 2010 for a way in which this may be done).”
Impact of supermassive black hole growth on star formation (2017, background): “Even the most simple “empirical” galaxy formation models require some process to “quench” the most massive galaxies[87].”
Galaxy formation in the Planck cosmology – I. Matching the observed evolution of star formation rates, colours and stellar masses (2014, methodology): “This behaviour has been noted previously (e.g. Bundy et al. 2006; Bell et al. 2007; Ilbert et al. 2010) and in particular by Peng et al. (2010) who used it as the basis of a simple, toy model for galaxy formation.”
The confinement of star-forming galaxies into a main sequence through episodes of gas compaction, depletion and replenishment (2015, background): “If the MS scatter arises due to short term fluctuations in the star-formation history, similar mass SFGs mostly growup together (e.g., Peng et al. 2010; Behroozi et al. 2013).”
The galaxy luminosity function at z ≃ 6 and evidence for rapid evolution in the bright end from z ≃ 7 to 5 (2014, background): “…remains unclear whether the shape of the bright end of the LF at z ' 5 − 7 is really driven by evolution in dust properties or by mass quenching (e.g. Peng et al. 2010), or early AGN feedback (or indeed by some other as yet poorly understood mechanism for regulating star formation), forthcoming…”
SDSS IV MaNGA – spatially resolved diagnostic diagrams: a proof that many galaxies are LIERs (2016, background): “6 reproduces the well-know increase in the red fraction (here generally represented by quiescent and eLIER galaxies) as a function of mass (e.g Peng et al. 2010).”
BLACK HOLE VARIABILITY AND THE STAR FORMATION–ACTIVE GALACTIC NUCLEUS CONNECTION: DO ALL STAR-FORMING GALAXIES HOST AN ACTIVE GALACTIC NUCLEUS? (2013, methodology): “…evolution in the galaxy stellar mass and luminosity functions (similar to the analysis of Conroy & White 2013) while also accounting for the distribution of SFRs as a function of galaxy mass, as in recent studies of galaxy formation (e.g. Peng et al. 2010; Behroozi et al. 2013; Lilly et al. 2013).”
3D-HST: A WIDE-FIELD GRISM SPECTROSCOPIC SURVEY WITH THE HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE (2012, background): “There remains some tension in the recent literature whether galaxy-mass-driven effects (Peng et al. 2010) or the properties of their host dark matter halos (Wake et al. 2012) are the dominant factors shaping the star formation histories of galaxies.”
The Herschel* PEP/HerMES luminosity function - I. Probing the evolution of PACS selected Galaxies to z ≃ 4 (2013, background): “When computed at different redshifts, the LF constitutes the most direct method for exploring the evolution of a galaxy population, describing the relative number of sources of different luminosities counted in representative volumes of the Universe.”
PRIMUS: CONSTRAINTS ON STAR FORMATION QUENCHING AND GALAXY MERGING, AND THE EVOLUTION OF THE STELLAR MASS FUNCTION FROM z = 0–1 (2013, methodology): “…environment, AGN content, and dark-matter halo mass are critical for determining galaxy quenching, and the evolution of galaxy bimodality (e.g., Weinmann et al. 2006; Bell et al. 2007; Kimm et al. 2009; Peng et al. 2010; Wetzel et al. 2012; Woo et al. 2012; Aird et al. 2012; Knobel et al. 2012).”
THE KMOS3D SURVEY: DESIGN, FIRST RESULTS, AND THE EVOLUTION OF GALAXY KINEMATICS FROM 0.7 ⩽ z ⩽ 2.7 (2014, neutral): “2.5 (Peng et al. 2010; Whitaker et al. 2012a).”
The star formation history of CALIFA galaxies: Radial structures (2013, background): “2003; Fontana et al. 2006; Pérez-González et al. 2008), although environment can play also a relevant role (e.g. Peng et al. 2010).”
GAS REGULATION OF GALAXIES: THE EVOLUTION OF THE COSMIC SPECIFIC STAR FORMATION RATE, THE METALLICITY–MASS–STAR-FORMATION RATE RELATION, AND THE STELLAR CONTENT OF HALOS (2013, methodology): “The relevant αstars is that for star-forming galaxies, α = –1.45±0.05 (Peng et al 2010, Baldry et al 2012), which yields γ ~ 1.9 ± 0.2 for αhalo ~ –1.85 (Guo et al 2010).”
The green valley is a red herring: Galaxy Zoo reveals two evolutionary pathways towards quenching of star formation in early-and late-type galaxies (2014, background): “Most starforming galaxies live on the main sequence, so tracing the populations leaving the main sequence – those with lower sSFRs – probes the quenching mechanism(s) and, as Peng et al. (2010) showed, there may be at least two very different quenching processes.”
PHIBSS: Unified Scaling Relations of Gas Depletion Time and Molecular Gas Fractions (2017, background): “…typical time scale of ~0.5-1 Gyr, but their growth appears to halt when they reach the Schechter mass, M* ~ 1010.5-11 M, and they transition to the sequence of passive galaxies, in a process (or processes) termed ‘(mass) quenching’ (Kauffmann et al. 2003, Conroy & Wechsler 2009, Peng et al. 2010).”
Bulge mass is king: the dominant role of the bulge in determining the fraction of passive galaxies in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (2014, methodology): “Further, Peng et al. (2010, 2012) construct a phenomenological model, which fits the observed data extremely well; however, this does not necessarily reveal the base physical process(es) which cause the transition of galaxies from the blue cloud (of actively star forming main sequence galaxies) to…”
THE EVOLVING INTERSTELLAR MEDIUM OF STAR-FORMING GALAXIES SINCE z = 2 AS PROBED BY THEIR INFRARED SPECTRAL ENERGY DISTRIBUTIONS (2012, methodology): “This correlation has been observed in the local Universe (Brinchmann et al. 2004; Peng et al. 2010), as well as at intermediate redshifts 0.5 < z < 3 (Noeske et al. 2007; Elbaz et al. 2007; Daddi et al. 2007; Pannella et al. 2009; Rodighiero et al. 2010a, Karim et al. 2011, Magdis et al. 2010), and…”
Galaxy evolution in groups and clusters: star formation rates, red sequence fractions and the persistent bimodality (2011, background): “…their environment in considerable detail (e.g. Balogh et al. 2004; Hogg et al. 2004; Kauffmann et al. 2004; Blanton et al. 2005a), and more recent works have shown that a similar environmental dependence persists at least out to z ≈ 1 (Cucciati et al. 2006; Cooper et al. 2007; Peng et al. 2010).”